Dueling Pianos, a Secret Supper & a Night for the Wildlife
The last full weekend before harvest gets serious, and the calendar is leaning into long tables and live music. Hazy Mountain hosts back-to-back nights — a five-course honey supper Friday, the Wildlife Center of Virginia's gala Saturday — Southwest Mountains rolls two pianos into the 1903 Tasting Barn, and DuCard closes things out with a harvest dinner in the Pavilion. Here's your guide to 52 events across 27 venues in Charlottesville wine country.
Featured This Weekend
Wildlife Center of Virginia Annual Gala & Auction
Hazy Mountain Vineyards & Brewery — Afton · Saturday, August 15 · 5:30–10:00 PM
The Wildlife Center of Virginia treats roughly 3,000 sick and injured wild animals a year in Waynesboro, and this is the night that helps pay for it. Hazy Mountain hands over its mountain-view deck for an evening of dinner, wine and a benefit auction, with the Center's staff on hand to talk about the patients — bears, eagles, box turtles — your bidding sends back to the wild. Tickets are limited and the view down the Rockfish Valley at dusk is worth the drive on its own.
Venue Spotlight: Southwest Mountains Vineyards
2300 Whipper In Lane, Keswick · Fri & Sat 11–6, Sun 11–5
Ten minutes east of town, the estate's centerpiece is a fully restored 1903 barn that now holds the tasting room — old beams overhead, a quietly modern pour list in front of you. The vineyards are farmed in Keswick's distinctive soils and the cellar work is deliberately minimal, so the wines taste like the hillside they came from. Book a flight indoors, take a glass to the open-air tables above the vines, or reserve The Glade, their guided hike-plus-lunch walk along the estate trail. Reservations are recommended; walk-ins are welcome.
This weekend they bring back the dueling pianos — see Saturday, below.
Friday — August 14
A honeyed five-course secret, and porches full of music.
The Beekeeper's Table Secret Supper — Hazy Mountain Vineyards & Brewery, Afton · 6:00–9:00 PM
Five courses built around honey, timed to the Nelson 151 Honey Festival: rosemary-pistachio parfait, tree-ripened peach salad with Nelson County wildflower honey, seared salmon over nasturtium-lime sticky rice, a Caromont goat cheese plate, and a lavender posset to finish. Each course is poured against a Hazy Mountain wine, right down to the 2023 Petit Manseng barrel select. Seats are limited and it is exactly the kind of dinner that sells out quietly.
Friday Sundowner's: Mercy Creek — Merrie Mill Farm & Vineyard, Keswick · 5:30–8:30 PM
Merrie Mill's Sundowner's series does what the name promises — music that runs right through the good light. Mercy Creek brings harmony-driven Americana to the lawn above the vines while the Keswick hills go pink. Bring a low chair, order a bottle, and let the week end itself.
Isaac Hadden with Dara James & The Soul Disciples — Pro Re Nata Brewpub, Crozet · 7:00 PM
Guitarist Isaac Hadden is one of the more startling players to come out of Virginia in the last few years, and he is bringing Dara James & The Soul Disciples along for a night of soul, funk and long improvisation in PRN's music hall. Twelve rotating taps, Hops Kitchen out back, fire pits going, mountains in every direction.
Saturday — August 15
Two pianos, a lobster truck and a rock revival.
Dueling Piano Dinner Party — Southwest Mountains Vineyards, Keswick · 7:00 PM · $90
Back by popular demand, and for good reason: two pianos, two players, and a room that is expected to sing along. Dinner is served in the 1903 Tasting Barn with estate wines poured all evening, and the requests come fast once the first chorus lands. Tickets are $90 through Tock — last time this one went early.
Live Music: Rixeyville Revival — Keswick Vineyards, Keswick · Saturday afternoon
An afternoon of classic and contemporary rock on the Keswick lawn, kicking off around midday, with the Rixeyville Revival Band working through the hits while the tasting room stays busy behind you. No cover, no reservation, plenty of shade — the easiest Saturday plan on this list.
Cousins Maine Lobster at Hark Vineyards — Hark Vineyards, Earlysville · 12:00 PM
The Cousins Maine Lobster truck pulls into Hark for the afternoon: lobster rolls, lobster tots, the whole New England detour, parked in front of one of the prettiest young vineyards in Albemarle County. Order at the window, take it to a table on the hill, and pair it with something crisp and Virginian.
Sunday — August 16
String bands, a songwriter, and the harvest table.
Cider & Strings: An Afternoon with Hogweed — Potter's Craft Cider, Charlottesville · 2:00 PM
Hogweed comes up from Richmond with a bag of traditional tunes and a few of their own, played the way string bands are meant to be heard — close, loud enough, and with cider in hand. Potter's taproom in the old church on Rio Road is the right room for it.
Live Music: Carrie Hinkley — Eastwood Farm and Winery, Charlottesville · 1:00–4:00 PM
Carrie Hinkley plays the Eastwood patio for three unhurried hours — her own songs plus the covers she reshapes into something quieter. Eastwood is five minutes from Pantops but feels an hour out, and Sunday afternoon there moves at exactly the right speed.
Farm to Table Harvest Dinner — DuCard Vineyards, Etlan · 6:30–9:00 PM · $120
DuCard's annual harvest dinner fills the Pavilion with a menu sourced from farms you could point to from the parking lot, poured alongside the estate wines. It is $120 a seat and the proceeds go to Madison County 4-H and the county fair — a good dinner that funds a good thing, an hour north through some of the best driving in the state.
Browse all events at weekendr.info.