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Top weekend events: Philippine Cultural Arts Festival, Ellen DeGeneres, ArtWalk @ Liberty Station

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Philippine Cultural Arts Festival

11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Balboa Park, Park Boulevard and Presidents Way. Free. samahanphilippinedance.com/festival

With a focus on cultural heritage and entertainment, the Samahan Filipino Performing Arts & Education Center brings its annual Philippine Cultural Arts Festival to Balboa Park for two days of traditional performances. Learn about Filipino culture through folk dances from different regions of the Philippines, folk songs, bamboo percussion instrumentation on the angklung, or gong music of the Southern Philippines played on the kulintang. There will be workshops and presentations on these cultural traditions, along with more modern entertainment like rap, reggae, contemporary dance and singing, and other ethnic dance performances. In addition to performances, there are vendors with clothing and jewelry, and plenty of food, including lumpia, pancit and adobo. LISA DEADERICK

Ellen DeGeneres

8 p.m. Friday-Sunday. Balboa Theater, 868 Fourth Ave., Gaslamp Quarter. Sold out (must be 18 or older to attend). (800) 745-3000. ticketmaster.com (some tickets are being sold through independent ticket resale companies)

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On June 14, DeGeneres announced a three-city summer stand-up comedy tour, which kicks off Aug. 10-12 at San Diego’s 1,339-capacity Balboa Theater. Those shows — for audiences 18 and up — sold out in an instant, as did her dates in San Francisco and Seattle, where her shows will be filmed for a Netflix special. “It has been 15 years since I did a stand-up special,” DeGeneres said in a statement. “And I’m writing it now. I can’t wait. ... I’m excited to do it; I’m excited for you to see it. And now, each one of you, you get to Netflix and chill with me. How about that?” More from our preview here. GEORGE VARGA

Automobile Heritage Day Festival & Car Show

10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday. Kimball Park, East 12th Street and D Avenue, National City. Free. automobileheritageday.com

National City certainly has a significant history with motor vehicles — the well-known “Mile of Cars” along National Avenue, anyone? — and continues to celebrate that history each year with the Automobile Heritage Day Festival & Car Show. This summer staple rolls back into Kimball Park with about 200 entries displaying custom cars and competing for various awards, including turn-of-the-century cars, classic cars, muscle cars and motorcycles. All years, makes and models will be shined up for display, accompanied by live music, food, entertainment, activities for kids, and a chance to test drive an electric car. LISA DEADERICK

Weezer and Pixies, with Sleigh Bells

7:30 p.m. Saturday. Mattress Firm Amphitheatre, 2050 Entertainment Circle, Chula Vista. $20-$108, plus service charges. (800) 745-3000. ticketmaster.com

Who gets the credit for getting Weezer to record a cover version of “Africa,” the chart-topping 1983 Toto song that recently gave Weezer its first radio hit in eight years? Take a bow, “Mary from Cleveland,” the 14-year-old Weezer fan who mounted a Twitter campaign — as @weezerafrica — to implore the band to cover “Africa.” Mary’s tweets got the attention of Weezer drummer Patrick Wilson. Then, almost as fast as you can sing “Hurry boy, it’s waiting there for you,” Weezer recorded its simultaneously wry and reverent version of “Africa.” Toto has responded by covering Weezer’s “Hash Pipe.” Of course, Weezer is not averse to performing songs by other bands, as its versions of The Cars’ “Just What I Needed” and Radiohead’s “Paranoid Android” attest. It remains to be seen if Weezer’s Saturday concert at Mattress Firm Amphitheatre includes the band’s cover of the Pixies’ “Velouria,” if only because the Pixies are co-headlining. GEORGE VARGA

Hillcrest CityFest

Noon to 11 p.m. Sunday. Fifth and University avenues, Hillcrest. Free admission. fabuloushillcrest.com/cityfest-street-fair-music-festival

Hillcrest knows how to throw a party, and just weeks after San Diego Pride, the community is once again hosting a bash — the 2018 edition of Hillcrest CityFest, now in its 35th year. The art and music festival — expected to attract more than 150,000 attendees — takes over nine city blocks in the heart of Hillcrest. The festival will include live music as well as art, food and drinks from more than 250 vendors. CityFest — dubbed “Pride Light” — will feature an artists village as well as numerous stages for live acts. MICHAEL JAMES ROCHA

“Voyeurs de Venus”

Previews begin Sunday. Opens Aug. 18. 7:30 p.m. Thursdays; 8 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays; 2 p.m.Sundays. Through Sept. 9. Moxie Theatre, 6663 El Cajon Blvd., Rolando District. $18-$44 (discounts available). (858) 598-7620. moxietheatre.com

In the early 1800s, Europeans gathered to gawk at Saartjie Baartman, a Khoikhoi woman from South Africa who had been dubbed the “Hottentot Venus” and put on display as a sideshow spectacle. Lydia R. Diamond’s “Voyeurs de Venus” gives Baartman a new voice, as the play explores her story through the lens of a modern-day cultural anthropologist struggling with her own conflicts over her subject’s legacy. Moxie co-founder and former artistic chief Delicia Turner Sonnenberg returns to direct this dance-filled, humor-laced saga, a San Diego premiere. JAMES HEBERT

2018 Del Mar Summer Concert Series presents Aloe Blacc

Between 7:30 and 8 p.m. tonight, after the day’s last race. Seaside Stage, Del Mar Racetrack, 2260 Jimmy Durante Blvd., Del Mar. Free to race-goers, or $30 after the last race for general admission and $50 for VIP tickets. Race admission is $6-$8. Parking is $10-$25. (858) 755-1141. dmtc.com/concerts

Acclaimed singer-songwriter Aloe Blacc has several movies to his credit, including the James Brown biopic “Get On Up” and the new Imax travel documentary “America’s Musical Journey.” But if Hollywood directors need a unique American success story to chronicle in a feature film, this Laguna Hills-born son of Panamanian immigrant parents could be the ticket. Born Egbert Nathaniel Dawkins III, Blacc is best known as the co-writer and lead singer on the late EDM superstar Avicii’s “Wake Me Up,” a Celtic-rock-meets-dance-floor hit that in 2013 topped the charts in 22 countries. Before that, in 2010, Blacc’s simultaneously bouncy and bleak retro-soul song “I Need a Dollar” was used as the theme for the HBO series “How to Make It in America.” His fourth album is due out later this year, and Blacc, 39, performs a post-races concert tonight at the Del Mar Racetrack. GEORGE VARGA

Jennifer Lee album-release concert, featuring Peter Sprague

8 p.m. Saturday. Dizzy’s at Arias Hall (behind the Musicians Association building), 1717 Morena Blvd., Bay Park. $20. (858) 270-7467. dizzysjazz.com

The musical relationship between Bay Area singer Jennifer Lee and top San Diego guitarist Peter Sprague started in 2003. It was then that they teamed for her first album, “Jaywalkin’,” which also featured nationally acclaimed San Diego bassist Bob Magnusson. On Saturday, Lee and Sprague will perform at the all-ages Dizzy’s to celebrate the release of her third album, the aptly titled “My Shining Hour.” Eleven of its 13 songs were written by Lee, whoarranged all 13 with Sprague. Lee, who has a degreein art from the University of Massachusetts Amherst,sings and writes with warmth and clarity. Shesparkles whether performing her own materialor jazz and Brazilian-music classics. GEORGE VARGA

Coffee & Convos: “Unfiltered SD”

1 to 5 p.m. Saturday. Sandbox Venue, 325 15th St., East Village. $10. unfilteredsd2018.eventcreate.com

If you like your coffee strong, your conversation stimulating and your horizons expanding before your caffeinated eyes, you’ll want to make room in your busy weekend schedule for the second annual “Unfiltered SD” confab. Hosted by the Coffee & Convos podcast and digital platform and the MeKa Coffee company, “Unfiltered SD” highlights local foods and beverages along with works from local artists. Saturday’s gathering will feature MeKa Coffee, Modern Times Brewery and other San Diego vendors; an interactive live mural by Crash Boom Designs; and live music curated by the art label As We Arrive. Attendees will receive discounts from participating vendors, and the first 50 guests will receive a gift bag that includes a complimentary cocktail from Snake Oil Cocktail Co., goodies from Coffee & Convos and more. Come for the coffee, stay for the connections. KARLA PETERSON

ArtWalk @ Liberty Station

10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday; 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. Ingram Plaza at the Arts District at Liberty Station, 2751 Dewey Road, San Diego. Admission and parking are free. artwalksandiego.org/libertystation

ArtWalk — it’s always been about the art. And it still is, but this year, the ArtWalk @ Liberty Station team is bringing more live entertainment, a bigger food and beer and wine garden, and more interactive art installations. Get in touch with your inner artist through an abstract community mural and other art-making projects throughout the weekend, while checking out the creations of more than 200 professional artists working in a variety of media. CYNTHIA ZANONE

“Float,” a solo exhibition by Richard Becker

Through Oct. 7 at Sparks Gallery, 530 Sixth Ave., downtown San Diego. Free. (619) 696-1416. sparksgallery.com

For the past few years, Richard Becker has been drawn to things that are light and bright.The San Diego sculptor — whose commissions have ranged from busts of Ron Howard, Mary Tyler Moore and Vivian Vance for the Television Academy Hall of Fame to a World War II POW monument at Miramar National Cemetery — is now focusing on characters that are part child and part cartoon.“It’s the first time I’m doing something non-classically anatomical,” he said of the whimsical children he creates out of stainless steel and calls “tots.” That dramatic shift in style coincided with Becker’s restored hearing after a cochlear implant in 2014. His new work is the subject of a solo exhibition called “Float” at the Sparks Gallery downtown. MARTINA SCHIMITSCHEK

lisa.deaderick@sduniontribune.com

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