Returning to the area for its incredible 102nd year, an eagerly awaited six-day festival boasting games, competitions, vendors, and concert sets by more than two dozen national and local acts returns with the 2022 Mississippi Valley Fair, its August 2 through 7 engagement at Davenport's Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds boasting grandstand performances by chart-toppers, multi-platinum sellers, and multiple-award winners.

Delivering a blend of local history, environmental issues, education, entertainment, and fresh air, Davenport's River Action is again presenting a series of outdoor presentations in the final month of the annual Channel Cat Talks and Riverine Walks: weekly programs that, from August 3 through September 1, will address such topics as improvements to the Lock & Dam 15, green rooftops, the area's German-American heritage, and jazz masters Bix Beiderbecke and Louie Bellson.

Headlining a Raccoon Motel concert two days before his 30th birthday, singer/songwriter and rising country star Jesse Daniel plays the Davenport venue on August 3 in support of his 12-song album Beyond These Walls, with the artist lauded by Rolling Stone for his “swaying grooves and hot licks,” and by Sound & Soul as “nostalgic, stylish, and country to the core.”

With the New York Music Daily lauding their “darkly inventive Americana” and The Sound praising their “infectious, foot-stomping Americana tunes,” the touring musicians of Muddy Ruckus – guitarist and Quad Cities native Ryan Flaherty and “suitcase drummer” Erika Stahl – headline a July 28 concert at Davenport's Raccoon Motel, the duo's 2018 album Bellows to Mend described by Evolvement Radio as “hands down their best work so far.”

Held in conjunction with the Davenport venue's current exhibition John Leslie Breck: American Impressionist, the Brandywine River Museum of Art's Senior Curator Amanda C. Burdan will present a July 28 Scholar Talk at the Figge Art Museum, exploring the artwork of a highly recognized painter, and those who preceded and followed her, in “Impressionistes Américaines: Lilla Cabot Perry & the American Women Impressionists."

With most presentations in the Davenport Public Library's 3rd Thursday at Hoover's Presidential Library & Museum series have focused on people, the virtual July 21 event will instead focus on a specific place, with participants invited to explore the possibilities that lie ahead in A Behind the Scenes Look at the Hoover Library Renovation.

On July 26 and 27, the Davenport Public Library will host a pair of virtual author visits with rising literary stars whose works have been selected as part of the State Library of Iowa's All Iowa Reads program, with Kate O'Shaughnessy discussing her writing process and critically acclaimed The Lonely Heart of Maybelle Lane on Tuesday, and Rachel Mans McKenny, on Wednesday, providing a deep dive into her career and chosen title The Butterfly Effect.

Making a July 31 stop at Muscatine's Riverside Park as part of the group's six-city summertime showcase, the artists of Ballet Des Moines will showcase their full company of professional dancers in Gravity on Tour, an engaging and culturally enriching arts and education program co-presented by the Iowa Space Grant Consortium.

Returning to downtown Davenport for the 48th time, the Quad-City Times Bix 7 will find runners and walkers taking on a seven-mile foot race alongside live bands and cheering crowds, with the July 29 and 30 weekend also featuring numerous block parties – hosted by dozens of downtown-Davenport businesses – between the Rock Island Arsenal Bridge on the east to the Centennial Bridge on the west.

Nominated for five 2006 Tony Awards including Best Musical and described as a “fizzy confection” by Variety magazine, the musical version of Adam Sandler's film-comedy smash The Wedding Singer will entertain Clinton Area Showboat Theatre audiences from July 21 through 31, with composer Matthew Sklar and lyricist Chad Beguelin praised by New York Theatre Guide for their 1980s salute's “truly clever and often hilarious score.”

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