Tickets are half of what it typically costs to see them: $10 in advance through stage33live.com or $12 at the door. This is a 3:00 PM matinee on Sunday, December 3. As always, seating is limited and the performance will be recorded and filmed.

Castlebay weaves the heritage of New England and the Celtic lands in story and song, blending history, legend, and experience into engaging performance featuring Celtic harp, 12-string guitar, fiddle, tin whistle, strings, and woodwinds. Julia Lane and Fred Gosbee play poignant ballads interspersed with joyous dance tunes, with Lane’s ethereal soprano and Gosbee’s rich baritone giving life to the evocative imagery, beautiful melodies, and salty humor of the history and characters of life close to the elemental beauty of the sea and shore.They have released over three dozen albums and have toured the United States, Ireland, England, and Scotland, including five appearances at International Festivals of the Sea in the UK. Julia Lane is a past winner of the International Folk Harp Competition. Fred Gosbee is a musical instrument maker whose family worked as lumbermen in the forests of New Brunswick and Maine. They have loved, researched, and performed traditional music for most of their lives, and their original compositions — which have been heralded, sung, and recorded by other artists — will surely become part of that canon. 

Hiroya is a one-of-a-kind musician and composer — an eclectic, immersive, and mesmerizing internationally acclaimed guitarist who takes audiences on an innovative, impressionistic journey filled with earthy, organic soundscapes rich in subtle detail. A dizzyingly agile fingerpicker who always chooses beauty over bombast, his soulful and transcendent performances combine instrumental guitar work with lyrical performance and spoken stories.

Born and raised in Kyoto, Japan, he received a scholarship to Berklee College of Music and came to the US. Since then he has been performing internationally including at the United Nations, the Blue Note in New York, and on Japanese National Television. He has released seven albums. In 2022, he won second place in the International Finger Style Guitar Championship.Hiroya will also provide an opportunity of special interest to fingerstyle players of all levels of ability and accomplishment: An informal masterclass beginning at 11:00 AM, preceding his matinee concert. 

Wisdom on scales, thumb placement, tunings, improvisation, and more to help players improve and expand their talents, presented with kindness and patience and easy laughter by one of the best fingerstyle players in the world. Hiroya will demonstrate fingerstyle techniques, including chords and basic theory, breaking down elements such as tone and rhythm, explaining how to apply them to a practice routine. Questions will be warmly received. This workshop is strictly limited to ten participants, advance registration through the stage33live.com website is strongly recommended. Walk-ups will only be accepted if there's still room. The workshop starts at 11:00 AM on Sunday, December 17, and the cost is $30. A discounted class-plus-concert bundle is $40. This masterclass will take place here at 33 Bridge Street in Bellows Falls. Feel free to bring a lunch to eat after the class, or to pop out to a local restaurant before the concert. 

Stage 33 Live is a casual and intimate industrial-rustic listening room in a former factory hosting local, regional, and national performances and presentations of original material. No bar or kitchen, the stage is the mission; coffee / soda / juice / water and weird snacks available by donation. More info about the nonprofit, all-volunteer project, and this and other upcoming events, online at stage33live.com.Stage 33 Live gratefully acknowledges the help of so many individuals without whom none of this would be happening, and institutional support this season from The Island Corporation, the Vermont Arts Council, WOOL-FM, the Rockingham Arts & Museum Project, and Chroma Technology to help fund improvements and maintenance, and generally smooth out a lot of the rough edges. Stage 33 Live is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, and all donations are deductible to the fullest extent. Volunteers run the thing from stem to stern.