While she’ll be changing costumes eight or nine times a night between songs and dance routines during North Country Community Theatre’s production of The Secret Garden over the next two weekends, Lyme resident Maggie Finley for the moment is taking in stride her second starring role in a stage musical.
“The first night I did Annie, I was understudy for the girl who played Annie,” Finley, now 14, recalled last week of Northern Stage’s 2011 production. “I didn’t know I was doing it until about 10 minutes before it opened.”
After that trial by fire, and roles ranging from the teacup Chip in Beauty and the Beast to a Munchkin in The Wizard of Oz in recent years, Finley sounds ready to take on Garden’s troubled yet determined main character, the orphan Mary Lennox.
“The experience has made it much easier,” Finley said in a phone interview from her family’s Lyme Country Store. “I’m really comfortable doing all that stuff.”
Finley’s comfort level stood out, along with the acting and singing and dancing chops, during auditions and subsequent rehearsals.
“I was familiar with Maggie from seeing her work at Northern Stage, and though I had never worked with her, I was thrilled to have her come out for the role,” NCCT production manager Mary Gaetz said last week. “Maggie has worked her tail off from day one, really meshing with the other actors in the play. She is always eager to work, always full of generosity. She has great focus, great energy.”
Finley also has a renewed appreciation for the century-old novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett on which the musical is based. It follows Mary Lennox as she and the family who takes her in help each other heal from various traumas through the revival of a long-neglected garden.
“A long time ago, back in middle school, we read it in class,” said Finley, who recently completed her freshman year at Hanover High School. “I thought it was a great story. I didn’t know that there was music to it. The music is gorgeous.”
Finley traces her love of musicals to performing with and for Northern Stage and Opera North veteran director and actor Catherine Doherty.
“She was the Wicked Witch of the West and Miss Gulch in The Wizard of Oz,” Finley said. “She was a huge mentor for me.”
Finley also credits Upper Valley Music Center vocal teacher Julie Ness with helping her stay in tune (“You have to warm up your voice,” Finley said. “Lots of tea and honey”) and her fellow actors, including Jonathan Verge as Mary’s grief-ridden uncle Archibald Craven, with keeping her on cue for this newest challenge.
“The whole cast is awesome,” Finley said. “They all have beautiful voices.”
North Country Community Theater opens a producton of the musical adaptation of
Sonny Knight and the Lakers perform soul and R&B on the green in Hanover tonight at 5:30. Admission is free to this next concert in the Hopkins Center’s summer series. In the event of bad weather, the venue shifts indoors to Spaulding Auditorium.
The Walden Chamber Players play the Summer Music Associates’ first concert of the season tonight at 7:30 at the first Baptist Church in New London. The ensemble of French horn, violin, two violas and cello will perform works of Haydn, Mozart and Strauss. Admission costs $5 to $25. To learn more, visit summermusicassociates.com or call 603-525-8234. To get tickets in advance, call the aforementioned number or visit New London’s Morgan Hill Bookstore, Tatewell Gallery or the Chamber of Commerce.
∎The Sharon-based band Still More Cats performs a set of rock on the Norwich Green, Friday night at 6.
Performers from Opera North tune up for their 2016 season of Tosca, Evita and The Daughter of the Regiment with two concerts this weekend. On Saturday night at 6, the singers will perform an Artist Showcase at the United Methodist Church in Lebanon; admission is $25. And on Sunday afternoon at 5 at the Fells Historic Estate and Gardens in Newbury, N.H., they’ll celebrate the romance of estate founders Alice and Clarence Hay by performing songs of Gershwin, Rodgers and Hart, Puccini and Donizetti; to reserve tickets ($35) call 603-763-4789.
Next Thursday night at 5:30, Dartmouth College’s Hopkins Center for the Performing Arts will preview its 2016-2017 season for the general public with a launch party at Alumni Hall in Hanover. Margaret Lawrence, the Hop’s director of programming, will screen video clips of upcoming performers, among them roots singer Martha Redbone, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Mark Morris Dance Group accompanied by Yo Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, violinist Hilary Hahn and jazz pianist Brad Mehldau. Snacks from the Canoe Club will follow the presentation. Tickets will go on sale to the public starting July 29. To learn more, visit hop.dartmouth.edu/Online/seasonlaunch2016.
Accordionist Jeremiah McLane and pianist Annemieke Spoelstra will perform classical works of European and South American composers at the ArtisTree Community Arts Center in South Pomfret on July 15 at 7:30 p.m. Admission is $10. For more information, visit artistreevt.org.
As part of its annual Voxfest, the Dartmouth Department of Theater unveils several new works with a mix of free-admission workshops and staged readings tonight and tomorrow night at the Warner Bentley Theater.
Tonight’s shows include a 5:30 workshop of Grab the Land, which “examines identity, privilege and what it means to grow up American,” under the direction of 2004 Dartmouth graduate Cliff Campbell; and a staged reading at 8 of 2005 graduate Kate Mulley’s Grey Lady, about a woman seeking adventure and purpose during the Civil War.
Friday night’s offerings include a workshop of Macbeth in Rhythm at 5:30, and a staged reading at 8 of the folk opera Tear a Root from the Earth. For more information, visit hop.dartmouth.edu.
The New London Barn Playhouse continues its run of the musical comedy How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying with performances tonight, Friday night and Saturday night at 7:30, Sunday afternoon at 5, Tuesday night at 7:30, Wednesday afternoon at 2 and Wednesday night at 7:30. The musical closes on July 17. For tickets ($20 to $35) and more information, visit the box office in New London or nlbarn.org or call 603-526-6710.
The IMPACT ensemble of young actors from Jean’s Playhouse in Lincoln, N.H., performs a musical adaptation of the fairy tale Rapunzel at Claremont Opera House on Monday morning at 10. For tickets and more information about the opera house’s series of Monday Morning Musicals for Children, call 603-542-0064.
If you missed him in Hanover earlier this week, Liam Ryan-O’Flaherty, of Norwich, performs with Circus Smirkus in the teenage troupe’s swing through Keene on Monday and Tuesday at the Cheshire Fairgrounds. Shows on this year’s theme of “Up, Hup and Away! The Invention of Flight,” highlighting aerial acts, are scheduled for 1 and 6 p.m. both days. To reserve tickets ($15 to $22) and learn more, visit smirkus.org or call 877-764-7587.
Dave Clark performs bluegrass and Americana music at Colburn Park from 4 to 7 this afternoon, during the Lebanon Farmer’s Market.
∎ Spencer Lewis and the Folk Rock Project serenade the weekly Feast and Field Farmers’ Market in Barnard tonight from 5:30 to 7:30.
∎ The Conniption Fits play at Lebanon’s Colburn Park tonight at 7, as part of the Lebanon Recreation Department’s Front Porch series of summer concerts.
Gerry Grimo leads the East Bay Jazz Ensemble onto the Mary Haddad Memorial Bandstand in New London on Friday night at 6:30.
The folk duo of David Surette and Suzy Burke performs at the Sunapee Livery building in Sunapee Harbor on Friday night at 7. Doors open at 6:30. The suggested donation is $15. For more information about the concert and the series, visit sunapeecoffeehouse.org.
∎ As part of its Summer Festival tour of the state this season, on the theme of “Wanderlust,” the Vermont Symphony Orchestra performs at the Three Stallion Inn in Randolph on Saturday night at 7:30. Gates open at 5:30 for picnickers. For advance tickets ($32) and more information, including other venues and dates, visit vso.org or call 800-876-9293, ext. 10.
∎ Sunday afternoon at 2 in the Little Studio of the Saint-Gaudens National Historic Site in Cornish, Ensemble Amphion plays “Music from the Court of Henry VIII,” featuring works of Couperin, Telemann, Rameau and John Dowland. Admission to the concert is included with the $7 fee to enter the historic site.
∎ The Flames play rock classics of the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s on the bandstand at the Newport Town Common on Sunday night at 6.
∎The Upper Valley Community Band plays at Colburn Park in Lebanon on Monday night at 7.
Kid Pinky and The Restless Knights perform the blues on the Ben Mere Bandstand overlooking Sunapee Harbor on Wednesday night at 6:30.
The Brian Gatch Band plays folk rock at the Quechee Green bandstand on Wednesday night at 6:30.
Woodstock residents Rolf Diamant and Nora Mitchell talk about their new book, A Thinking Person’s Guide to America’s National Parks, at their hometown Norman Williams Public Library on Saturday afternoon at 4:30. They will sign copies of the book after the presentation.
The Gully Boys appear at Bentley’s restaurant in Woodstock tonight at 8 and songwriter-guitarist Sam Moss takes the stage on Friday night at 7:30.
The Dave Clark duo plays bluegrass and Americana at Jesse’s restaurant in Hanover on Friday night starting at 5.
Guitarist Tom Pirozzoli plays at the Canoe Club in Hanover on Friday night at 6:30. Following him to the stage with 6:30 to 9:30 shows over the coming week are guitarist Billy Rosen and bassist Peter Concilio on Saturday, the jazz trio of saxophonist George Rice, bassist David Westphalen and pianist Fred Haas on Sunday and jazz pianist Bob Lucier on Tuesday. And on Monday night starting at 5:30, Marko the Magician performs his weekly, tableside sleight-of-hand.
Erin Harpe leads her Delta Swingers into the New Socials Bar and Grill in Claremont for a night of blues starting at 7 on Friday.
The new funk band Toast sets the rhythm for dancing at Skunk Hollow Tavern in Hartland Four Corners on Friday night starting at 9.
The weekend lineups at the Upper Valley’s Salt hill Pubs feature acoustic rockers Bob Rutherford and Michael Spaulding in Lebanon on Friday night, and Saturday-night appearances by Alex Smith and the Mountain Sound in Newport, the indie band Sirsy in Hanover, and Enfield native Brooks Hubbard and the Conniption Fits in Lebanon. All shows start at 9.
Coquette pulls into Windsor Station to perform a set of rock on Saturday night at 10.
Ramunto’s Brick & Brew Pizza in Bridgewater hosts an open mic starting at 7:30 p.m. on Thursdays. Participants get a free large cheese pizza.
String players of all ages and abilities are welcome at the weekly acoustic jam session at South Royalton’s BALE Commons on Friday night from 6:30 to 10.
Joe Stallsmith leads a weekly Americana hootenanny at Salt hill Pub in Hanover, Mondays at 6 p.m.
Bradford’s Colatina Exit holds an open mic on Tuesdays at 8 p.m.
The Seven Barrel Brewery in West Lebanon runs an open mic on Tuesday nights, beginning at 8.
Jim Yeager hosts an open mic at Hartland’s Skunk Hollow Tavern, at 8:30 on Wednesday nights.
David Corriveau can be reached at dcorriveau@vnews.com and at 603-727-3304.