January 21, 2011 -- Want a great date this weekend?

Try lounging by a roaring fire, cup of tea in hand, while soaking in the latest live culture Santa Monica has to offer.

That's what you'll find at Fireside at the Miles, a choice selection of music and drama running every weekend until February 5 at the historic Miles Memorial Playhouse.

This Friday, you can listen to classical music performed by the Chamber Players of Los Angeles, who debuted at the Miles in 2006.

They return with a program called “International Voices” that ranges from Ukrainian folk tunes to a Chinese pastorale to Heitor Villa-Lobos' lyrical Bachianas Brasilieras No. 5. The program closes with a quintet for string quartet and double bass by Antonin Dvorak.

Or you might want to catch Saturday's solo show, when “Shakesperian drag king” Lisa Wolpe presents her tour de force “Shakespeare and the Alchemy of Gender.”

Wolpe turns convention on its head as she plays roles from the Elizabethan Renaissance and, her programme says, “reveals the physical and spiritual secrets of cross-gender performance.”

The next two weekends feature opera, the blues, an eclectic “post-classical” sextet and experimental a capella vocals.

All shows start at 8p.m. at the Miles Memorial Playhouse at 1130 Lincoln Boulevard. Parking is free at 808 Wilshire Boulevard. For details and reservations click here.