"Build it and they will come," intoned Matt Gordon, manager of the restaurant at The Stone Church music club in Newmarket. He's standing atop Zion Hill, right next to the club on the newly stone-paved patio, arms spread to present a dozen empty tables encircled by a split rail fence. The other employees nearby laugh, but it's Saturday afternoon, the first sunny day after a week of rain, and the next thing you know, some friends come by to say hi after a bike ride, then decide to stay for a cold beer. A group of regulars in their early 20s comes walking up the hill. A couple from Barrington who know the place from its first incarnation in the 1970s stop in to see what's happening these days. Tonight's band pulls up in their van and starts unloading for the show.

That kind of neighborly feeling is exactly what The Stone Church owners are celebrating this Saturday, June 4, with the second annual Spring Classic, a daylong celebration of local music, art, history and cultural heritage.

It's been a year and a half since Peter Hamelin, Paul Nessel and John Pasquale bought The Stone Church music club after it had been closed for several months, and Memorial Day weekend marks a year since their first public event, the Spring Classic music festival at the Sugar Shack in Lee ("In a soggy, wet field. That was awesome," laughs Hamelin). Soon after, still working on renovations, they held an open house with a concert in the parking lot of the Historic Society next door. Truffle headlined the show-they were hot, but the debatable hit of the day was the eclectic collection of tools, household items and mill memorabilia at the Historic Society, where volunteers offered tours of its two floors that day.

The second annual Spring Classic combines the elements of the outdoor show with the block-party feel of the open house. A series of well-regarded bands will mine the veins of jazz-funk-soul-groove-roots-reggae traditions.

"All these bands are musicians that have deep roots at The Stone Church," Hamelin says. "Percy Hill was formed at the University of New Hampshire and The Stone Church was their launching pad. This is the first time they'll be back since we opened. They haven't played here in five years, I think. Nate Edgar plays bass with Toussaint and the China Band, and he grew up here in Newmarket. Funkfoot is a young band that lives in Newmarket, practicing their butts off four days a week. Truffle, I think, has played more shows than any other band that's ever played here. And the Amorphous Band is led by Chris O'Neill, who's a Newmarket resident and one of the best guitarists on the scene right now."

Like last year, all the funds raised at the open house will benefit the Historical Society. In a new twist, Hamelin says they'll turn the inside of the Church into an art gallery for the day. The Lamprey Arts and Cultural Alliance will offer an exhibit of work by about two dozen local artists, to be shown from noon to 6 p.m. Thirty percent of art sales will go back to LACA to help fund artist work and gallery space in the newly reinvigorated Newmarket Mills.

In the year since they opened, the owners of The Stone Church have built a reputation for providing a solid night of entertainment, but there have been some adjustments along the way. After struggling with drawing people to a high-end restaurant off the beaten path, they recently expanded the menu to offer dinner at lower prices and include new sandwiches and burgers (named after beloved icons from Jimi Hendrix to Say Zuzu), while retaining their classic "Public Supper" entree options as occasional nightly specials. The upstairs room was supposed to be renovated last winter, but funds evaporated before work could get started; a revamped business plan should help open the hall this fall. In the meantime, seeing no outdoor dining options in Newmarket, they built the outdoor patio. The blacksmith who added musical notes to the original hand-crafted stair rails will return to fashion a gate for the patio.

"And when it stops raining in July, we're going to be able to serve dinner out there, do more stuff during day, maybe even offer some light acoustic music out there," Hamelin says.

The Spring Classic marks a celebration for the Church, along with the first public event for LACA and an enormous fundraising opportunity for the Historic Society. The combined event pins the small town of Newmarket at the heart the Seacoast's cultural heritage map, at least for the day. And that's just the beginning, Hamelin promises.

"It's a whole new market," he's fond of punning. When teased about the bad joke, he insists, "This is not a pun, this is a vision.