Join AARP Vermont for Fun, Discounted Events!

Did you know that making and enjoying music can stimulate your brain, trigger memories and emotions, connect you with other people and enrich your life, according to a report from AARP’s Global Council on Brain Health (GCBH).

Music engages multiple parts of the brain — including those involved in memory, thinking skills, movement, attention, language and emotion — and helps them work together, according to the report, which is based on a review of scientific literature by independent experts.

To read more about music and brain health, check out these links:
The Magic of Music and the Brain
The Extraordinary World of Music and the Mind
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Get to know AARP Vermont at events and concerts around the state with discounted admission, sponsored by AARP. Discover new possibilities in your community and get to know us and what we're doing in Vermont. We look forward to seeing you!

*Please note that none of the events listed are AARP events. Any information you provide to the host organization will be governed by its privacy policy.

DISCOVER JAZZ FESTIVAL MAIN STAGE

JUNE 5 & JUNE 9 - BURLINGTON
Flynn Theater Main Stage - Tickets at flynnvt.org
AARP Members & Guests Get 15% Off - Use promo code JAZZFEST2024

June 5 - Cécile McLorin Salvant w/ Melanie Charles
June 9 - Robert Glasper w / Aja Monet

Burlington Discover Jazz Festival is back for it's 41st year. This year’s festival takes place across Downtown Burlington from June 5-9. The Flynn is also thrilled to announce the opening and closing events of the festival. Haitian-American composer, singer, and visual artist Cécile McLorin Salvant, who Dr. Angela Davis called, “without a doubt, her generation’s most accomplished jazz vocalist,” opens the festival on the Flynn Main Stage on June 5 at 7:30 pm. The festival closes with one of the towering figures of the modern jazz scene: five-time Grammy-winner Robert Glasper on the Flynn Main Stage on June 9 at 7 pm.

BRISTOL LIGHTNING

JUNE 8, 2024 - PUTNEY
Next Stage Arts - Tickets at nextstagearts.org
AARP Members & Guests Get 15% Off - Use promo code 50Plus

An Odyssey of American Music
In 1927, the first country music records were cut in Bristol, TN/VA, by ordinary people with ordinary stories and the courage to create. Now, almost 100 years later, Bristol Lighting is born in the same town, celebrating the American stories of today. From Aaron Copland to American roots music blues, bluegrass, and beyond, Bristol Lightning’s live shows take the audience on a high-energy adventure of bluegrass cello and mandolin, blues guitars, tap dance, and storytelling, weaving a powerful and poignant tapestry of the true creativity and resilience of the American spirit.

Bristol Lightning is the baby of cellist Dave Eggar. He’s a student of the great American composer Aaron Copland and the legendary cellist Yo Yo Ma. Eggar has performed, recorded, and arranged for artists across genres, including Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Coldplay, Frank Ocean, John Legend, Lewis Capaldi, Tony Bennett, and Andrea Bocelli, to name a few. He is a Grammy-nominated composer, has scored multiple films, and regularly performs in the classical and American roots music worlds. Dave teamed up with two-time Grammy nominee Phil Faconti (who has worked with Norah Jones and Foreigner) and Bristol locals Blake and Jamie Collins to form Bristol Lightning.

DORSET THEATRE FEST SUMMER SEASON

JUNE 21-SEPTEMBER 7-DORSET
Dorset Theatre - Tickets at dorsettheatrefestival.org
AARP Members & Guests Get 10% Off - Use promo code 50Plus

This season's productions include:
THE BEAUTY QUEEN OF LEENANE
June 21 - July 6
The darkly comic Irish tale and international hit play by Academy Award-Winner Martin McDonagh, directed by Dorset’s Resident Playwright and Pulitzer Prize and Emmy Nominee Theresa Rebeck.

NATIVE GARDENS
July 12 - July 21
A property line disagreement turns into an all-out border dispute in one of America's top 10 most produced comedies that BroadwayWorld calls, "Timely, thoughtful, and hilarious.”

SIDEKICKED
August 2 - August 17
It’s Friday night 1960 and Vivian Vance is about to turn herself into America's favorite neighbor for the last time in a tour-de-force play revealing the Ethel Mertz you never knew.

TRUE ART
August 23 - Sept 7
Deception, champagne, and Michelangelos collide in a suspenseful World Premiere comedy about the discovery of a lost masterpiece from the playwright behind the recent hit play Boca, Jessica Provenz

GUSTER

JUNE 29 - SHELBURNE
Shelburne Museum - Tickets at highergroundmusic.com
AARP Members & Guests Get 15% Off - Use promo code 50Plus

Guster with James Kochalka Superstar and Zeno Mountain Band at Ben & Jerry’s Concerts on The Green at Shelburne Museum.
Not long before the making of their new album Ooh La La, Guster celebrated three decades together as a band—a journey that’s included landing a series of hits on the Billboard charts, working with luminaries like Steve Lillywhite and Richard Swift, launching their own music festival, and amassing an ardent fanbase partly on the strength of their relentless touring and deeply communal live show. But despite reaching a milestone few musical acts ever come close to attaining, Guster’s ninth studio LP reveals a band fully in touch with the voracious creative energy that first inspired their formation. A major leap forward for lead vocalist Ryan Miller, guitarist Adam Gardner, drummer Brian Rosenworcel, and multi-instrumentalist Luke Reynolds, Ooh La La ultimately matches that wide-eyed spirit with a newly heightened sense of confidence, conviction, and commitment to the raw sincerity that’s made them so beloved.

“In all the time we’ve been together we’ve never really felt our age as a band—we’re still so hungry, still excited to create,” says Gardner. “A lot of people have told us they’re amazed at how democratic our process is, but I think that’s a big part of why we’re still able to open up this space where the ideas just flow. It also helps that we’ve built a relationship with our fans where there’s a real sense of trust and a desire for us to keep growing and keep pushing ourselves. It’s such a gift that allows us to be truly free, and to make whatever music we want to make.”

VSO SUMMER FESTIVAL

JULY 3-6- GRAFTON, SHELBURNE, SO. POMFRET, E. BURKE
Tickets at www.vso.org/events
AARP Members & Guests Get 15% Off - Use promo code Stars15


Discounted tickets to four of the six VSO Summer Festival shows:
July 3 at Grafton Trails and Outdoor Center in Grafton
July 4 at Shelburne Museum in Shelburne
July 5 at Saskadena Six in South Pomfret
July 6 at Burke Mountain in East Burke

Celebrate the great outdoors and VSO’s 90th birthday with the 2024 Summer Festival Tour: Symphony of Stars! Join the orchestra for spectacular evenings of music by Sufjan Stevens, Margaret Bonds, Vermont’s own Erik Nielsen, John Philip Sousa marches, John Williams’ E.T. score, and more – plus spectacular solos from VSO’s musicians! Music Director Andrew Crust leads the ensemble featuring Principal Cello John Dunlop, Principal Clarinet Kelli O’Connor, and Principal Percussion D. Thomas Toner. Bring your picnic and relax under balmy summer skies with your Vermont Symphony Orchestra!

ALWAYS ... PATSY CLINE: A Timeless Tale of Friendship and Great Music

JULY 12,13,14-GREENSBORO
Highland Center for the Arts - Tickets at highlandartsvt.org
AARP Members & Guests Get 10% Off- Use promo code 50Plus

Featuring 27 of Patsy Cline’s biggest hits, such as “Walkin’ After Midnight,” “I Fall To Pieces,” and “Crazy,” Always…Patsy Cline is a timeless tale of friendship and great music.

In 1961, country music legend Patsy Cline met Louise Seger, a fan from Houston, at a honky-tonk music hall. The two struck up a friendship that continued via letter-writing until the singer’s tragic death years later. An international hit for three decades, Always…Patsy Cline welcomes home the fans who have loved this classic for years, and invites new generations to discover Patsy and Louise.

This new production at Highland Center for the Arts in Greensboro, Vermont, features singer and director Heidi Lauren Duke. Heidi Lauren studied voice at Vanderbilt University in Nashville and has performed and directed musicals all over the United States and Europe. Ms. Duke has made appearances locally with GAAR/Mirror Theatre, The Civic Standard, Stowe Theatre Guild and Vermont Vaudeville. The production will also feature some of the region’s favorite instrumentalists, and the many hits of Patsy Cline will warm your heart and have you dancing in the aisles.

VT INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

OCTOBER 18-27 - BURLINGTON
Main Street Landing Performing Arts Center - Tickets at vtiff.org
AARP Members & Guests Get $2 Off - Use promo code 50Plus

VTIFF hosts a ten-day panorama of independent films from around the world with screenings followed by filmmaker Q&As and daily receptions.