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Some of the musicians who will be playing at Barnstock 2013 gathered for a recent photo shoot. The festival returns this Friday and Saturday off Black Farms Road. That’s organizer Miles Brown at right. (David Boraks photo)

Head out and enjoy several community events this weekend as summer starts to heat up. Tonight, enjoy a wine tasting and live music ^[3] at The Wine Cellar starting at 7pm in Cornelius, or grab a drink and enjoy music by Billy Jones and Friends ^[4] on Summit Coffee’s back porch at 8pm. Also tonight, the Davidson Community Players continue their performance of Leading Ladies ^[5] at 8pm in the Duke Family Performance Hall on Davidson’s Campus. Read on for more highlight’s of this weekend’s events calendar.

Preschool  ^[6]Story time, an event to help preschoolers develop language and pre-reading skills, continues at the Davidson Library this Friday at the Davidson Library from 10:15-10:45am. The Cornelius Library continues its Page to Screen series ^[7] with a special screening of The Princess and the Frog inspired by the Brothers Grimm tale The Frog Prince, July 26th at 2pm in the Cornelius Library. Barnstock ^[8] also kicks off this Friday – read below for more details.

Saturday morning, the Catawba Riverkeeper Foundation will be having a Rubber Duck Race ^[9] in Freedom Park in Charlotte on July 27 at 10:30am.  The race will be followed by the Annual Meeting for the Catawba Riverkeeper Foundation at the Mahlon Adams Pavilion in Freedom Park, which will feature the annual State of the River Report from the Catawba Riverkeeper. Thousands of rubber ducks will race down approximately 600 feet of Little Sugar Creek in Freedom Park. The Rubber Duck Race is intended to raise money and awareness for CRF’s advocacy, education, and protection programs. In the evening, The Cornelius Arts Center Indies + Docs series presents “The Iran Job: The Story of an American Basketball Player in Iran.” ^[10] The screening and reception will be held at the Cornelius Arts Center on July 27th from 7-9:30pm. Tickets are $8. Now Are the Foxes ^[11], a local improv comedy group, also takes the stage in Cornelius at the Warehouse Performing Arts Center this Saturday at 8pm.

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Flier for Friday’s event – Bike Night. Click to enlarge.

BARNSTOCK THIS WEEKEND

Five years ago, a group of young musicians got together to play some music on a farm outside of Huntersville. They called it Barnstock, invoking the legendary rock festival Woodstock, and made it a fund-raiser for the most local of causes: The volunteer Davidson Fire Department. This year, Barnstock is back – and bigger than ever.

The two-day festival begins with with a 21+ Bike Night on Friday, July 26, and continues Saturday, July 27, with an all-day, all-ages music festival at the barn, 15300 Black Farms Road, Huntersville. They’ll have music, a volleyball tournament and food trucks. For a complete schedule and more information on the event, visit our coverage on DavidsonNews.net’s Guide: Barnstock returns, with 2 days of live music ^[13]. 

Friday night’s event will be a fundraiser for both the fire department and Dick Sanderson Riding 4 Life, a charitable organization in honor of Dick Sanderson of Davidson, who has been dealing with Lou Gehrigh’s disease (ALS) since 2004. This is the latest event by his friends and family to raise money for ALS research and to support the Sanderson family.

A Saturday volleyball tournament organized with the help of coaches from W.A. Hough High School will raise money for Hope for Holt. Holt is a 6-year-old who lives in the Peninsula neighborhood suffering from a rare genetic disease called cystinosis. Meanwhile, Saturday’s main event will be the festival, from noon to late night, featuring a dozen local bands. They include returning favorites Chasing Pedestrians and Brody and Choch, Masterjaxx & Grim Featurz, and a variety of other local bands in different musical genres.

NEW CALENDAR, MORE EVENTS

See more weekend events in our expanded Events Calendar ^[14]. We’re continuing to add new features and make it easier to find events on a given day. Choose between a calendar view, or a list of events, and sort by category in the drop down menu in the right sidebar.

We’ll be adding more capabilities in the coming days, and are test-driving a user submitted events feature ^[15]. Contact our editor at editor@davidsonnews.net ^[16] for more information, and stay tuned for more updates.

See our calendar: http://davidsonnews.net/guide/events/ ^[14]