AS FOR blues gatherings they don't come much better than the Bowness Bay Blues Weekend, which starts tomorrow (Friday) with umpteen award-winning performers

Sunday headliners David Migden and the Twisted Roots represented the UK at the 2014 European Blues Challenge in Riga. And Laurence Jones, Saturday's top of the bill, won Young Artist of the Year in the British Blues Awards.

Brilliant blues singer and guitarist Matt Woosey has just been named Acoustic Artist of the Year by international magazine Blues and Soul. Also in the line-up, is sultry-voiced, jazz-influenced singer Zoe Schwarz (of Zoe Schwarz Blue Commotion) who was runner-up in the female vocalist category of the British Blues Awards and top blues rock guitarist Robin Bibi, who has played with big names including Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, and young alt blues band Stark who have made recent highly acclaimed appearances at London's legendary 100 Club.

For full details of all this year's performers visit http://www.bownessbayblues.co.uk/.

Organised by the Rotary Club of Windermere, the 2014 festival raised over £6,000 for Automated External Defibrillators for the Windermere First Responders Team as well as other charities. The main beneficiaries from the 2015 event will be the Alzheimer's Society and Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Tickets are available from Kendal's Brewery Arts Centre on 01539-725133.

Billed as the Wordsworth Daffodil Legacy, this Sunday seven gardens throughout Cumbria are open under the National Garden Scheme, including Dora’s Field, where poet William Wordsworth first planted daffodils in memory of his daughter. As well as Dora’s Field, the other gardens featured are Acorn Bank, High Close Estate, High Moss. Holehird Gardens, Low Fell West and Rydal Hall. Full details of the gardens are available on the NGS website www.ngs.org.uk and the Yellow Book.

Cartmel Choral Society performs Felix Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah at Cartmel Priory on Saturday (7.30pm). Adrian Self, who celebrates his 25th anniversary as director of Cartmel Choral Society, conducts with soloists Tracie Penwarden (soprano), Tamsin Jones (contralto), Robert Thompson (tenor), Jolyon Dodgson (bass) and Andy Plowman on the organ. Mendelssohn’s extremely dramatic work, was a huge success when first performed in Birmingham in 1846. Tickets at the door and from Cartmel Priory Shop.

This year's Kendal and District Gilbert and Sullivan Society show is The Pirates of Penzance, running from last night (Wednesday) until Saturday (March 28, 7.30pm) at Kendal Town Hall. One of the most popular shows in the G&S canon, the much-loved mix of sentimental pirates, blundering policeman, absurd adventures and improbable paradoxes, features superb soprano Emily Robinson taking the part of Mabel with tenor Neil Hastings as Frederick. Box office on 01539-821844.

The eminent Hallé orchestra grace the Lakeland Sinfonia Concert Society series on Saturday (7.30pm) with pianist Denis Kozhukhin as soloist. Conducted by Karl-Heinz Steffens, the Westmorland Hall programme includes Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake Suite, Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No1 in D flat, and the Sibelius Symphony No 1 in E minor. There is a pre-concert talk at 6.30pm in the Westmorland Hall. Tickets on 01539-722533.

PRO Nobis give the first complete performance of Clive Walkey's Missa Brevis on Sunday (7.30pm) at St Mark's Church, Natland. Accompanied by organist Hugh Davies and directed by Clive, the choir's programme From Darkness to Light also features music from the 16th Century, motets and anthems by Humphrey Clucas and Herbert Sumsion, and shorter choral works of Brahms. Additionally, Hugh will play organ music by Bach, Brahms and Schumann. Tickets on 01539-723482.