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The Coal Shed Music Festival will feature more than 80 performers over eight days on the Yarmouth waterfront, singing everything from blues to rock to country, folk, gospel, alternative and more.

The summer music event, running Thursday to Sunday and Aug. 23-26, was created as a fundraiser for the Yarmouth Food Bank. Admission is free except for a donation to the food bank.

The Coal Shed Music Festival was first organized in 2007 as a means to showcase local talent from all musical genres to collect donations to help stock the local food bank. This goal has been expanded to fundraise for the breakfast program at local schools.

For the first time there will be two venues, the waterfront behind Killam Brothers, 90 Water St., and next door on the wharf behind Rudder’s Restaurant.

The musicians hail from Yarmouth, Digby and Shelburne counties. There will also be performances by bands with Yarmouth roots.

For information and schedule updates, visit coalshedmusicfestival.com.

The 11th annual Kempt Shore Bluegrass & Country/Folk Music Festival will be held Friday to Sunday at Peterson’s Festival Grounds, 5701 Hwy. 215, Kempt Shore, Hants County.

Performers include A New Shade of Blue, Close to Home, Shadow River, Ryan Cook, Saddle River String Band, Tom Terrell & Modern Grass and The Elliott Country Swing Band.

For information, visit www.novascotiabluegrass.com or call 633-2229 or 798-6422.

The Hopping Penguins will be on stage for their annual reunion at the Shore Club in Hubbards on Saturday.

This high-energy, 10-piece band all hailed from Halifax and over the years they have gone their separate ways, but every August they get together to play reggae, ska, funk, dance and R&B.

Doors open at 9:30 p.m., with dancing from 10 p.m.-1:30 a.m. Tickets are $12 at the door.

A flea market and antique sale will be held on Saturday from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the former Horton High School site in Greenwich. Rain date is Sunday.

A live auction of some special items will begin at 11 a.m.

The event is a fundraiser for Valley Voices, the women’s chorus that sings four-part harmony in the barbershop style and competes annually in regional and international contests.

Joan Kunsch will be the guest teacher at the Maritime Conservatory of the Performing Arts’ summer dance intensive, Monday to Aug. 31, at the conservatory, 6199 Chebucto Rd., Halifax.

A classical ballet teacher, Kunsch is associate director of Connecticut’s Nutmeg Conservatory for the Arts. Teaching and choreography have taken her to Oslo, Stockholm, London, Reykjavik, major North American cities and 33 states. She is part of a team that has produced dancers making careers with over 70 professional companies in the U.S.A. and abroad.

Kunsch has served on university dance faculties and as ballet mistress for Momix and Ballet Mississippi. She has written for Pointe Magazine, and her book of poetry Playing With Gravity (Antrim House, 2007) has been followed by a CD. With her sister, Kathi Byam, she is part of a performing duo called Flute Meets Poem.

Other guest teachers for the summer intensive, headed by the Conservatory’s dean of dance Barbara Dearborn, are Kennert Oberly and Jane Wooding.

The program includes a study of classical ballet, pas de deux, conditioning, pointe, classical repertoire and history. Repertoire will be from the ballet Les Sylvides. Excerpts from this piece and original choreography from guest teachers will be performed at the end of the intensive gala.

For information or to register, visit www.maritimeconservatory.com, or call 423-6995.