Looking for something to do on Saturday? The Straight’s got you covered. Here are 70 events happening in or around Vancouver on Saturday, December 8.

CONCERTS

CapU alumnus Gord Grdina teams up with his quartet of New York City-based performers at the BlueShore Financial Centre for the Performing Arts.

Nashville-based singer-songwriter Conner Youngblood performs tunes from his debut album Cheyenne at the Fox Cabaret.

Experimental electronic musician the Soft Moon plays the Fortune Sound Club, with guests Hide and Vive Le Void.

The Big Easy Funk Ensemble performs New Orleans funk and holiday classics at the Fairview Pub.

Bill Mays & The Toronto Chamber Jazz Septet perform a jazzy version of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite at Maple Ridge's ACT Arts Centre.

Martina Griffiths performs jazzed-up selection of holiday themed songs at XY.

Tributes to Elvis, Roy Orbsion, Connie Francis, Patsy Cline, and Brenda Lee are performed at the Royal Canadian Legion, Crescent Branch.

BENEFITS

The annual Lights of Hope charity Christmas-lights display on St. Paul's Hospital features more than 100,000 lightbulbs and supports the St. Paul’s Foundation.

CHRISTMAS

The annual VanDusen Festival of Lights is a winter wonderland featuring approximately one-million Christmas lights.

Carousel Theatre for Young People hosts a family carolling evening at the Waterfront Theatre.

ETCETERA

Eastside Flea is a modern day flea market at Eastside Studios featuring a curated mix of vintage clothing and collectibles, locally handmade goods, and artisan eats.

FOOD AND DRINK

The Riley Park Winter Farmers Market at Nat Bailey Stadium features produce from over 70 farms, plus coffee and food trucks.

KIDS' STUFF

Experience the old-fashioned magic of Christmas at Burnaby Village Museum's Heritage Christmas.

COMEDY

Comedian Ryan Stout performs the third of three nights of standup at the Comedy Mix.

Anime improv-comedy featuring local Asian-Canadian performers at Havana Theatre's Fistful of Kicks.

Comedy Basement at Goldie's Pizza features standup comedy by headliner Gavin Matts.

ARTS ETCETERA

Curious Imaginings--an immersive sculpture exhibition featuring the hyper-realist, fantastical creatures of Australian artist Patricia Piccinini--continues at Strathcona’s historic Patricia Hotel.

Douglas Coupland’s radical art installation at the Vancouver Aquarium, Vortex, takes an imaginative journey to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, immersing viewers in the ocean-plastic pollution crisis.

The two-day North Delta Potters Christmas Sale at the North Delta Recreation Centre features functional to funky pottery crafted by guild members.

The two-day Shiny Fuzzy Muddy at Heritage Hall is an artist-curated collection of fine art, craft, and design.

Season of the Witch at the Rio Theatre is a the story of a girl in 17th-century New England accused of witchcraft, as told through dance and burlesque.

Artisan Craft Fair at Collingwood Neighbourhood House features handmade gifts for the holiday season.

Spirit of the Season at New Westminster's Van Dop Gallery features original artworks at accessible prices.

DANCE

Karen Flamenco Dance Company dancers perform their latest production, Pinocchio, at the Improv Centre.

MUSIC

The Vancouver Children's Choir presents timeless holiday music with Carol of the Child at Christ Church Cathedral.

A Classic Christmas features a performance of Handel’s Messiah at Richmind's Fraserview MB Church.

The Laudate Singers and Baroque Chamber Orchestra perform at North Vancouver's Highlands United Church.

A Hollywood Christmas with The Modern Strings Quartet features music from movies at Richmond's City Centre Community Centre.

Opera Mariposa presents a fresh take on Mozart's romantic comedy, Cosi fan tutte, at Marpole United Church.

THEATRE

Performance at Presentation House Theatre of Tim Webb and Kim Selody's family-oriented play, Holiday Baking Time, in which young audience members are invited to become bakers and join in the sugary joy.

Performance at the Cultch Historic Theatre of Little Dickens, Ronnie Burkett’s raucous, adults-only take on the beloved holiday classic, A Christmas Carol.

Performance at the York Theatre of East Van Panto: Wizard of Oz, in which Dorothy and Toto are flung to the magical Land of Oz, aka Nanaimo and Hastings.

Performance at Richmond's Gateway Theatre of a new musical adaptation of the holiday classic It's a Wonderful Life, based on the Frank Capra film.

Performance at Havana Theatre of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, in which "the worst kids in the history of the world" take over an annual Christmas pageant.

The Arts Club Theatre Company presents a performance at Goldcorp Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre of Blind Date, Rebecca Northan's fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants fusion of clown, improv, theatre, and social experiment.

Pi Theatre presents the final performance at the Orpheum Annex of American playwright Taylor Mac’s work, Hir.

Seven Tyrants Theatre presents John Patrick Shanley’s Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, Doubt: A Parable, at Tyrant Studios.

The Arts Club Theatre Company presents Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, Lauren Gunderson and Margot Melcon's holiday confection filled with classic Jane Austen charm, at the Granville Island Stage.

Carousel Theatre for Young People presents A Charlie Brown Christmas and You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown at the Waterfront Theatre.

Performance at North Vancouver's Theatre at Hendry Hall of the seasonal pantomime Treasure Island.

Re-imagining of C.S. Lewis’s classic tale of hope, change, and sacrifice, The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, at Pacific Theatre.

The Arts Club Theatre Company presents the fairy-tale musical, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, at the Stanley Industrial Alliance Stage.

GALLERIES

Hunkpapa Lakota (Sioux) artist Dana Claxton addresses the oppressive legacies of colonialism through photography, film, video and performance in Dana Claxton: Fringing the Cube at the Vancouver Art Gallery.

The Vancouver Art Gallery presents the Canadian premiere of Guo Pei: Couture Beyond, the first-ever fashion exhibition in the Gallery’s history, which traces the evolution of China’s foremost couturière over 10 years.

Batia Suter: Parallel Encyclopedia Extended at Polygon Gallery is an installation of photographic reproductions that highlight the proliferation of digital images.

Polit-Sheer-Form Office at Vancouver Art Gallery's Offsite is the first Canadian exhibition by the Chinese contemporary art collective.

Body Language: Reawakening Cultural Tattooing of the Northwest at the Bill Reid Gallery sees guest curator Dion Kaszas of the Nlaka’pamux First Nation trace the deep-rooted traditions of Indigenous tattooing, piercing and personal adornment.

Discover the Vancouver Art Gallery’s permanent collection through an exhibition of nearly 90 paintings, drawings, photographs, and sculptures in A Curator’s View: Ian Thom Selects.

Looking at Persepolis: The Camera in Iran 1850-1930 at Polygon Gallery features contemporary video and photographic works by Hannah Rickards and Batia Suter.

The Vancouver Art Gallery presents The Metamorphosis, an exhibition drawn from its collection that examines transformation and change.

Interface: The Woven Artwork of Jaad Kuujus at Bill Reid Gallery explores the intricate textile works and cedar weavings of the Kakwaka’wakw and Haida artist.

MUSEUMS

Shakeup: Preserving What We Value at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC explores the convergence of earthquake science and technology with Indigenous knowledge and oral history.

Marking the Infinite at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC features nine leading Aboriginal women who are revered matriarchs and celebrated artists from remote regions of Australia.

Haida Now: A Visual Feast of Innovation and Tradition at the Museum of Vancouver is guest-curated by Kwiaahwah Jones and features more than 450 works by carvers, weavers, photographers and print makers, collected as early as the 1890s.

Richmond's Lipont Place hosts Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition, which focuses on the legendary RMS Titanic's compelling human stories through more than 120 authentic artifacts and extensive room re-creations.

Wild Things: The Power of Nature in Our Lives at the Museum of Vancouver delves into the life stories of local animals and plants—how they relate to each other and how they connect people to nature in the city.

In a Different Light: Reflecting on Northwest Coast Art at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC features more than 110 historical indigenous artworks and explores what we can learn from these works and how they relate to indigenous peoples’ relationships to their lands.

In/Flux: Art of Korean Diaspora at the Museum of Vancouver features selected works of Jin-me Yoon, Junghong Kim, and Jin Hwa Kim, artists originally from the Republic of Korea now based in the Vancouver area.

ATTRACTIONS

West Vancouver's Cypress Mountain features skiing and snowboarding lessons, snowtubing park, cross-country ski trails, downhill skiing and snowboarding trails, and snowshoeing tours.

Parq Vancouver is a 24-hour casino with 600 slot machines and 75 table games, eight restaurants and lounges, and the sixth-floor outdoor Parq.

Science World features hundreds of interactive exhibits in five permanent galleries, live science demonstrations and workshops, and giant movies in the Omnimax Theatre.

At the Bloedel Conservatory you can take in more than 200 free-flying exotic birds and 500 exotic plants and flowers.

North Vancouver's Mount Seymour features skiing and snowboarding, lessons, chairlifts, terrain parks, tubing and tobogganing, and snowshoe trails.

The Vancouver Aquarium features almost 800 animal species in galleries ranging from Canada's Arctic to the Amazon rainforest.

The Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden is an authentic representation of an age-old garden tradition that reached its peak in the Ming Dynasty.

North Vancouver's Grouse Mountain features a Skyride to the peak with views of the city and the Pacific Ocean, plus ziplines, skiing and snowboarding, a sliding zone, snowshoeing, and a skating pond.

MOVIES

Screening at Vancity Theatre of Finding Big Country, Kathleen S. Jayme's documentary about former Vancouver Grizzlies basketball player Bryant “Big Country” Reeves.

Afternoon screening at the Rio Theatre of Rob Reiner's 1987 fairytale adventure The Princess Bride. 

Screening at the Cinematheque of Gray House, Austin Lynch and Matthew Booth's meditation on solitude and the American psyche, with filmmakers in attendance.

Screenings at Vancity Theatre of War of the Buttons, Older Than Ireland, and A Date for Mad Mary as part of the Vancouver Irish Film Festival. 

For all the latest Metro Vancouver event announcements and updates follow @VanHappenings.