Heritage Square

Bring your jackets and blankets for the opening show sponsored by Flagstaff's Downtown Business Association, Friday night at dusk at Heritage Square. The movie is Disney's Enchanted. The Flagstaff High School band will play beginning at 6 p.m. and the movie begins at sundown.

Saturday afternoon you can experience live traditional Mexican dance at Heritage Square beginning at 2:30. Or take in a whole day of Cinco de Mayo celebration activities in the Sunnyside neighborhood.

There will be dance performances by Canyon Movement Company Friday night and Saturday afternoon at NAU's Studio Theatre. Inspired by the beautiful, artistic quilts of Gee's Bend, Alabama, Canyon Movement Company has created dances reflecting the time and place represented by those quilts. Experience the story of the women who live there and how they survived the oppression, poverty and difficulties of the time. Click here for details on the performances.

Saturday is National Astronomy Day! You can celebrate at Flagstaff's historic Lowell Observatory, where telescope viewing, indoor presentations, historic exhibits, and prize giveaways will begin at 5:30 p.m.. At 7 p.m. Lowell docent Howard Israel presents, Myths & Legends of the Sky.

Of course, the streets and downtown will be filled this weekend with NAU graduates and their families -- this is Graduation Weekend at Northern Arizona University. Congratulations 2008 grads!

Ambicion -- Featured Band - Noon Saturday

The Sunnyside Neighborhood Association of Flagstaff will host its 10th annual Cinco de Mayo Cultural Celebration, beginning Friday evening and continuing through Sunday.   Enjoy a parade Saturday beginning at 10:00 a.m. Throughout the weekend, find Mariachi music, atisan craft booths, Folkloric dancers, food, car and bike shows, and carnival rides. Click here for a schedule of stage performances.

Cinco de Mayo is a traditional Mexican victory celebration. In the United States, Cinco de Mayo has taken on significance beyond that in Mexico. It has long been celebrated throughout the Southwestern U.S., but is also celebrated in Mexican-American communities throughout the country as a cultural event.

Have fun in Flagstaff this weekend!

Another great weekend in Flagstaff, beginning with First Friday Artwalk. Here are four of the Flagstaff art walk hotspots tonight (click here for a map of all 46 art walk stops):

1. Debbie Leavitt comes out of hiding again as part of the infamous EAST SIDE TEN at an UNDERCOVER exhibition at FCRS (old Unity space in Knoles Village Square), 2708 N 4th St/Ste E-1. Also see art by Bess Bennett, Rebecca Borowski, Ivan Bronston, Denise Dee, Elaine Dillingham, Mike Frankel, Grace Iverson, Betty Smith & Rachel Wilson and SPECIAL GUESTS: Ballet Folklorico and The Electric Army from 6-9pm. (#41 on the Map)
2. Shonto Begay opens his art studio upstairs on Aspen Avenue, featuring his newest artworks that are smaller and more affordable! This is a great time to start or add to your collection! (#11 on the Map)
3. LEANCY RUPERT's BFA graduate show is this Friday at Harton's BEAVER STREET GALLERY on South Beaver. (#18 on the Map) See the culmination of years of growth and work - you might remember Leancy's year-long-stint as president of the Artists' Coalition of Flagstaff.
4. Northern Arizona University’s chapter of Engineers Without Borders will host Water is Life at 2 S. Beaver. This event includes art in several mediums, food, a silent auction, and folk music. Proceeds will benefit the chapter’s sustainability project in Ghana.

Friday night, stop in and rest from your walk at 16 W. Cherry, where, beginning at 7:30 p.m., the NAU Shrine of the Ages Choir will be for its final performance of the season.

Courtesy of Rob Huntley's Smugmug Photo Gallery

The Northern Arizona Book Festival may be the highlight of the Flagstaff weekend, but there are lots of other things happening in Flagstaff this weekend, including an Arbor Day Celebration at the Arboretum, the annual Soar Into Spring Kite Festival, and lots of music and art events.

Tonight, Flagstaff Arts & Leadership Academy presents TIMESTEP at Sinagua High School at 7 p.m. In this annual spring dance concert, students perform African, Ballet, Jazz, Modern and Tap dances. There will also be a silent auction to raise funds for FALA's Dance program.

Also this evening, the NAU Percussion Ensemble will perform in concert at 7:30 p.m. in Ardrey Auditorium. The concert will feature two significant works for percussion keyboard instruments, plus a concerto for marimba and percussion ensemble.

Tomorrow the 6th annual Soar into Spring Kite Festival offers carnival games & rides, live family entertainment, arts & crafts, craft fair, food vendors, non-profit activity expo, bounce house, climbing wall, pony rides, petting zoo, and, of course, kite flying activities. Saturday 11:00 AM- 4:00 PM at Foxglenn Park.

At the other side of town at the Coconino Center for the Arts, you can enjoy a day of Recycle Art Workshops and Demonstrations. Beginning at 11 am Robert Zappanti creates Duct Tape Sculptures, at noon find Musical Playground with Bryan Cooperrider & Craig Merriwether make percussion instruments and compose music, and  3 pm transfer black Recycled Art Logo onto t-shirts or fabric bags/sweatshirts!

Balloons will be launched Saturday afternoon by National Weather Service in Bellemont during a free public open house. Learn how local area meteorologists create warnings and forecasts using the latest in weather forecast technology. Guided tours will be provided demonstrating weather tools (Advanced Computer Models, Lighting Observations and Satellite Imagery). Saturday from 11:00 AM- 5:00 PM

Is it football season? NAU seems to think so. They are holding a scrimmage and barbeque at 11:30 a.m. Saturday at the Skydome:  "Come check-out the new talent and the new turf in the dome!" $5.00 includes BBQ lunch.

Children's Chorale of Flagstaff proudly presents: "Spring Serenade Tales of the Tall Wind" at the Museum of Northern Arizona.  Features music from the Children's Chorale of Flagstaff, buffet style lunch catered by Simply Delicious, wine tasting and more! A silent auction will also be held featuring coveted pieces from local artists. $25 per person    Saturday, 1-2:30 p.m. for luncheon, auction, wine tasting; 2:30 concert.

NAU Spring Festival of Choirs happens Sunday afternoon at Ardrey Auditorium. Performances by four NAU choir ensembles and the Harold M. Harter Memorial Handbell choir. Adult: $12, faculty/staff/senior: $10; students w/ID: free.   3-4:30 pm

Sunday evening, the NAU Brass Ensembles will be featured in concert. Ensembles include the trombone choir, horn ensemble, brass quintet and trumpet ensemble. 7 p.m. at Ashurst Auditorium. Free.

The Miser and Our Town continue as dramatic features in Flagstaff this weekend. See last week’s post for details.

Have a great weekend! If you'd like to buy a Flagstaff home, give us a call!

Flagstaff will be alive with literature and literacy events over the next eight days. The Northern Arizona Book Festival was founded in 1998 by the Literacy Volunteers of Coconino County as a direct and tangible link between basic literacy efforts and ambitious literary endeavors. With the hyperbole to which book-lovers often seem inspired, the downtown Flagstaff book festival has been called the “premier cultural event of the Northland” as well as the “single greatest reason to live in Flagstaff!”  I think there are lots of other reasons to live in Flagstaff as well. Nonetheless, the next week’s events certainly are some of the reasons. 

Although the official festival begins Friday, our local bookstore, Bookmans, will host a reading this evening by author Evan Handler. The actor and critically-acclaimed writer is best known as Harry Goldenblatt from HBO’s Sex and the City and  is the author of the memoir Time on Fire: My Comedy of Terrors. The event runs from 7 p.m. – 8 p.m. Wednesday. There are several other similar events surrounding the festival this week and next.

Throughout the weekend, beginning Friday, downtown Flagstaff will be filled with authors and their audiences for the main event. Visit the Northern Arizona Book Festival calendar page for a full schedule of events. Enjoy workshops as well as book discussions, and head back to Bookmans Sunday morning for a gathering of authors making themselves available for book-signings. Proceeds from the festival benefit Literacy Volunteers of Coconino County.

Thursday, May 1, Literacy Volunteers will host its annual Mountain Spelling Bee  fund-raising event. RE/MAX Peak Properties has adopted Literacy Volunteers of Coconino County as its community-giving target. Our agents contribute funds and time as tutors to the literacy effort. Team Heitland at RE/MAX Peak Properties will enter a team in the spelling bee – last year we won the “Spirit Award” after coming close to taking first prize in the final round. This year, we have a spelling ringer and hope to win. Come see us at the Radisson Woodlands on May 1 from 6 p.m. - 9 p.m., join in the fun and benefit a good cause.

Flagstaff celebrates Earth Day Saturday with service projects from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. and fun and learning projects beginning at 11:30.  Service projects will be clean-up at Olivia White Hospice Garden, McMillen Mesa, Southside, N. Izabel, and Sunnyside. Starting at 11:30 and continuing to 4 p.m. on City Hall’s front lawn, you’ll find music, award presentations, and a lecture/exhibit. (Update: I'm told there will be great arts and crafts exhibits, too!)

Music of all types will ring throughout the weekend in Flagstaff. On Friday night, Flagstaff Folk Project hosts Flagstaff-based classical guitarist Craig Yarbrough in concert. Works by Bach, Brouwer, Turina, Hunter/Garcia, and more will be performed at the Unitarian Church, 510 N Leroux St. beginning at 7:00 p.m.

For some classical chamber music, Friday night, go to Ardrey Auditorium at 7:30 pm for the NAU Chamber Orchestra performance of Masterworks No.6 Bohemian Rhapsody.

Saturday night, at Coconino Center for the Arts, you’ll find Sons and Brothers and their special guest Heart Prairie starting at 7:30 p.m. This performance is the last in a series presented by Flagstaff Friends of Traditional Music in partnership with Flagstaff Cultural Partners.

Also on Saturday night, David Hidalgo & Louie Perez, two of the founding members of Grammy-winning Los Lobos perform Stories and Songs. At the Orpheum at 8 p.m.

Sunday night, Lowell Observatory astronomer Jeffrey Hall will give a presentation about global warming, seen from an astronomical perspective. This special event also features telescopes set up for viewing with Saturn as a featured object to view. 7 p.m.

Friday and Saturday nights and Sunday afternoon, NAU Theatre presents The Miser by Moliere, adapted by Miles Malleston. The Miser is Moliere's comic satire on materialism -- a story of cunning, guile and double-dealing. At the Clifford White Theatre – Performing Arts Building, Curtain 8:00 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 2:00 p.m. Sunday. Performances also on April 23, 24, 25 and 26. To purchase tickets call the NAU Central Ticket Office at (928) 523-5661.

Meanwhile, at Theatrikos, Our Town, continues Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. For an earlier post about the performance, click here.

April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month. The Flagstaff Exchange Club will be passing out literature about child abuse prevention this Saturday at local businesses.  This is a part of a national effort by the club on Saturday, April 19, from 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. Look for Exchange Club members at Safeway on Highway 89N, Homeco Ace, and Petland. (I’ll be at Petland!)

Coventry Cathedral

Be there when the news is made this Friday night at Audrey Auditorium, where the choice for new Musical Director of the Flagstaff Symphony Orchestra will be announced. In addition, the night will feature what is sure to be a great performance with Flagstaff’s own Dr. Edith Copley conducting Britten's War Requiem. Special soloists Deborah Raymond, Steven Spears and Kurt Ollman will join the NAU Shrine of the Ages Choir and the Flagstaff Symphony Orchestra. Performance begins at 7:30 p.m. Friday at NAU’s Audrey Auditorium.

For a special treat, I recommend attending this week’s pre-concert lecture at Ashurst Auditorium. A buffet dinner will be served beginning at 5 p.m. Northern Arizona University College of Arts and Science faculty will discuss “Britten’s War Requiem In Context.” Tickets for dinner and the panel discussion are $25.  Click here for ticket information for both the Flagstaff Symphony Orchestra performance and the pre-concert event.

Also on Friday night, NAU will host a reception for visiting Japanese artists to celebrate the opening of an exhibit featuring their contemporary art. This will be at the Old Main gallery on the NAU campus, beginning at 6 p.m. (Watch for traffic, this is right near Ashurst!)

A kickoff, fund-raising event for this year’s Northern Arizona Book Festival also happens Friday night at Uptown Billiards (114 N. Leroux St., Flagstaff, Arizona) starting at 6 p.m. This will be a Celtic Poetry Reading and Scotch Tasting. All proceeds from the tasting will benefit the 11th annual book festival, which is coming up later this month.

Saturday at the Coconino Center for the Arts, enjoy workshops and demonstrations about recycled art. Up the road at the Museum of Northern Arizona, you can hear a geologist talk about the Grand Canyon at 2 p.m.

Late Saturday afternoon, you can enjoy figure-skating demonstrations by all age categories of the Flagstaff Figure Skating Club. The event begins at 4:15 p.m. at the Jay Lively Ice Rink. Suggested donations to support the club are $3 per person.

There are several music options in Flagstaff Saturday night – consult the Community Calendar of the Arizona Daily Sun.

Performances of Our Town by Thornton Wilder continue this weekend at the Doris Harper White Playhouse in downtown Flagstaff. This prize-winning classic is set in a small New Hampshire town as the U.S. came out of the Great Depression. Show times are 8:00 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and 2:00 p.m. on Sunday. This Theatrikos play runs weekends through April.

Have a great weekend in Flagstaff!  (We’ll be selling real estate…. Call us if you need a Flagstaff home!)

Spring is trying to break though in Flagstaff, though the mountains still have snow and today we experienced a bit of freezing rain. But the gardens are open at The Arboretum of Flagstaff, where you will find a full complement of exhibits and activities this time of year.  Saturday afternoon, illustrator Diane Iverson of the children’s book Rascal:  The Tassel-Eared Squirrel will be on hand from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. to explain her techniques and for book-signing. The Visitor Center will feature her illustrations throughout April and May.

Our Town by Thornton Wilder opens Friday at Theatrikos in downtown Flagstaff. This prize-winning classic is set in a small New Hampshire town as the U.S. came out of the Great Depression. Show times are 8:00 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and 2:00 p.m. on Sunday. This Flagstaff community theatre play runs weekends through April.

Another theatre option this weekend in Flagstaff, if any tickets are still available, is You're A Good Man Charlie Brown, performed by the Northern Arizona University’s drama team at NAU’s Studio Theatre. Performances are scheduled through Sunday.

Kickoff the weekend with a linguistics lecture by a professor from my old alma mater, The University of Chicago. This is the last lecture in the series Language Across the Univers(ity) and is entitled "Is 'Message' in Meltdown in the 2008 U.S. Presidential Campaign?" The lecturer, Michael Silverstein, is author of the book Talking Politics: The Substance of Style from Abe to "W".  The lecture begins at 3:30 Friday afternoon at the Business Auditorium at Northern Arizona University.

Let’s hope it’s warm Friday night for First Friday Artwalk, sponsored by Flagstaff Cultural Partners. (Of course, the event has made it through the winter, so it has to be warmer for this one than it has been for the last four!) Thirty-three Flagstaff locations will be open Friday night from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. with local artwork on display. Download a map with locations by clicking here.

Saturday morning, you can begin your day with a delicious Mexican breakfast at the American Legion Hall in downtown Flagstaff, where you’ll see youth dancers of Ballet Folklorico de Colores practice during their fund-raiser. From 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. For more information call 856-1538.

Or, if you’d like to start Saturday earlier, and take a two-mile bird-watching tour with the Northern Arizona Audubon Society, show up at Willow Bend Environmental Education Center at 7:45 a.m. for a walk south on the Flagstaff Urban Trail System to the I-40 wetlands. Take the bus, ride a bike, or take a hike to Willow Bend at 703 E. Sawmill Road. Bring a binocular, water, snacks.  Return time to Willow Bend is estimated at noon. Call Lauren for more details at 928-773-4866 or e-mail lbh32@nau.edu

Saturday night or Sunday afternoon, take in Handel’s Serse, to be performed by Northern Arizona University’s Opera Company. Performances are at Audrey Auditorium at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 2:00 p.m. Sunday.

Wrap up the weekend with a three-mile hike with the Scalawag Mountain Climbers on Sunday afternoon beginning at 3 p.m., starting from the Cave’s Crater Trailhead off of Silver Saddle Road in Doney Park.