Dalton Town Band plays Barrow's St James Church(Saturday, 7.30pm) with proceeds towards church funds and the Ann Hood Award, which helps gifted local youngsters pay for their music tuition. Conducted by Mark Lamiter, the band's programme covers a wide spectrum of music from excerpts of Verdi's La Traviata, Rossini's overture to Tancredi, pop tunes from the likes of Ronan Keating and Robbie Williams, to an arrangement of I'll Walk with God, made famous by Mario Lanza. Tickets are £3.50 in advance on 01229-823054 or at the door.

THE Westmorland Orchestra is back on the concert circuit with the second concert of its season at Kendal Leisure Centre's Westmorland Hall on Saturday, March 13 (7.30pm). Violinist Lorraine McAslan is the soloist in a programme celebrating the music of Antonin Dvorak, who died in May 1904. More news on the Westmorland front is that distinguished pianist Martin Roscoe has agreed to be the orchestra's new president following the death of Jack Brymer. Tickets are £9/£8 adults/ children £4.50/£4 from the leisure centre box office on 01539-729702 or orchestra members.

A moving production about Zimbabwean life is staged at Kendal's Brewery Arts Centre on March 5 (8pm) when UK Arts International and Over The Edge Theatre Company present Born African, the story of ordinary people in modern Africa. The story moves between the present, the past and perhaps a little bit of an uncertain future in a time when Zimbabweans, white and black, are facing the honest truths and injustices of their history, and being forced to take sides. Tickets are £9.50/£8.50 concessions.

IT IS that time of year again for the Cumbria preliminary round of the All-England Theatre Festival of one-act plays. Among the thespians treading the boards of Grange-over-Sands' Victoria Hall on Saturday, March 13 (7pm) are CATS, Barrow Amateur Operatic and Dramatic Society and Swarthmoor. The winners go on to the North West divisional final at the Grange hall on May 1. Tickets at the door: £4 adults/ £3.50 oaps/£2 children under-16.