Tickets are on sale for the High Country’s most exciting summertime series of arts programming. Get yours today, because the fun begins on June 28 for the Weicholz Global Film Series, July 1 at the Turchin Center for Visual Arts, and July 9 for the Schaefer Popular Series, with a vast array of shows you don’t want to miss scheduled throughout the month of July.

Music, theatre, visual arts, dance, film — whatever you’re looking for as the temperatures rise in the High Country this year, you’ll find it on the lineup for An Appalachian Summer Festival.

With countless opportunities to enjoy top quality artistry in your own backyard, there’s no better way to celebrate the summer season than with this annual multidisciplinary arts festival, which is recognized as one of the top university-based attractions in the southeastern United States.

With ticket prices ranging from $5-$50, as well as several free events, the festival offers unique opportunities for residents and visitors to create arts experiences suited to their individual artistic tastes and budgets.

There are several ways to get your tickets, so check out appsummer.org for details.

Take a look at this year’s lineup and start making plans to celebrate with App State this summer.

2016 Festival Season

Schaefer Popular Series:

Broadway and Beyond with Tony Award Winner Kelli O’Hara

Saturday, July 9

8 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

Tony Award-winning Broadway leading lady Kelli O’Hara has dazzled audiences and critics alike in the most recent revivals of “The King and I,” “South Pacific,” and “The Pajama Game.” Performing with a quintet, Ms. O’Hara takes the stage for an evening of Broadway showstoppers and familiar favorites from the Great American Songbook.

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Pat Benatar & Neil Giraldo and Melissa Etheridge

Saturday, July 15

8 p.m., Holmes Convocation Center

This co-headlining show will feature Grammy and Oscar-award winner Melissa Etheridge, with four-time Grammy-winning Benatar, performing with long-time bandmate and husband Neil Giraldo. Performing their classics hits, fans can expect Etheridge’s “Ain’t It Heavy” and “I’m the Only One,” as well as Benatar’s chart topping “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” and “Love Is a Battlefield.”

Pink Martini

Monday, July 25

8 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

Pink Martini performs a stylish and sophisticated blend of jazz, classical, and old-fashioned pop on concert stages around the world, bringing together unique melodies and rhythms to create an eclectic and modern sound.

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Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue

Saturday, July 30

8 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

New Orleans native Trombone Shorty is the bandleader and frontman of Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue, a hard-edged funk band that employs hip-hop beats, rock dynamics and improvisation in a jazz tradition.

Jerry Douglas Band with special guest Mipso

Saturday, Aug. 6

8 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

Dobro master and 13-time Grammy-award winner Jerry Douglas is a forward-thinking recording artist whose artistry incorporates elements of bluegrass, country, rock, jazz, blues and Celtic into his distinctive musical vision. The evening includes special guest Mipso, a North Carolina string band that takes three-part harmony and Appalachian influences into new territory.

Classical Music Programming:

Broyhill Chamber Ensemble

July 6, 20, and 31

8 p.m., Rosen Concert Hall

Every summer, violinist Gil Morgenstern, Artistic Director of the Broyhill Chamber Ensemble and its international “Reflections Series,” assembles several of the nation’s most exciting and acclaimed chamber musicians for an exquisite concert series embracing a diverse repertoire of chamber music works.

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Eastern Festival Orchestra with Gerard Schwarz, Music Director

Sunday, July 10

4 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

Under the direction of Maestro Gerard Schwarz, the Eastern Festival Orchestra returns to the festival for an afternoon of memorable symphonic music featuring soloists Julian Schwarz, cello, and Marco Núñez, first-prize winner of the 2015 Rosen-Schaffel Competition for Young and Emerging Artists.

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Rosen-Schaffel Competition for Young and Emerging Artists

Sunday, July 17

1 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

The festival, in partnership with the Hayes School of Music, proudly presents the sixth season of the highly acclaimed Rosen-Schaffel Competition for Young & Emerging Artists. In the final live round of the competition, a panel of symphony conductors will select a First Place, Second Place and Third Place Winner and the competition audience will select an “Audience Choice Award Winner.”

Theatre Programming:

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Reduced Shakespeare Company: “William Shakespeare’s Long Lost First Play”

Thursday, July 7 and Friday, July 8

8 p.m., Valborg Theatre

The Reduced Shakespeare Company’s production of “William Shakespeare’s Long-Lost First Play” is a comic misadventure that will feel strangely familiar yet excitingly new. Every famous character and Shakespearean plot device come together in a single story so comically outrageous it’s no wonder the Bard of Avon hid it away.

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In/Visible Theatre: “Mauzy”

Friday, July 28 and Saturday, July 29

8 p.m., Valborg Theatre

“Mauzy” is a play about tale-telling, about songs, about how storytellers can mix so deep into the stories themselves that they never find their way out—out of the story, or out of the mountains, or back to the world of the living.

Dance Programming:

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RIOULT Dance NY: “Bach Dances” with live music by the Broyhill Chamber Ensemble

Saturday, July 23

8 p.m., Schaefer Center for the Performing Arts

“Bach Dances” is a series of powerful dances set to Bach masterpieces, characterized by a unity of music, movement, and art. The festival is proud to present an evening that blends the artistry of a company at the forefront of contemporary dance today with the prodigiously talented musicians of its resident chamber ensemble.