McGrath, Venice in November is cold and very damp and misty. Take warm clothes with you! I am sorry but I can't give you any advice for hotels, because those in the town center are too expensive and when I was in Venice I stayed in Mestre, a town (full of factories and ugly) on the mainland. Regarding music, to find traditional venetian music it's difficult; maybe I'm too cynical, but I'm afraid that the most of people that have been heard singing by others Mudcatters did so for "turistic reason"....But in the last ten years there have been another revival of traditional music in the whole of Italy, and probably if you can move a bit from Venice to the mainland you can find something. I'll try to do a search on Internet for some festival or similar in that period.
If you see announcement for "celtic music " in Venice, you better take care not to stumble on some show of the Lega , a political party, strongly racist and to the extreme right, who claim the "celtic roots" of North Italy (!!!)
And If you would stay a little longer, you could take a south bound train and stay some day in Florence; I have another room and I would be very glad to give hospitality to the both of you.
paola