Taking place in two cities, two states, and more than two dozen venues, the popular summertime traveling festival Alternating Currents returns to Davenport and Rock Island from August 17 through 20, a Quad Cities celebration of music, film, comedy, and visual arts boasting more than 100 musical performances, comedy sets, film screenings, local art displays, and even pro-wrestling.

German toys have had a significant impact on the world's toy industry, particularly in the areas of design and innovation, and through January 7, these wondrous innovations will be on display in Klassiks for Kinder: German Toys with Joy, an interactive, family-themed exhibition housed in Davenport's German American Heritage Center.

Touring internationally with his "The Age of JAJ" tour that Curtain Call Broadway deemed "a fantastic hour of comedy that will leave you in awe," actor, standup, and current Saturday Night Live performer James Austin Johnson plays Maquoketa's Codfish Hollow Barn on August 17, treating patrons to his uniquely hilarious worldview and talents for impersonation that find him, on SNL, doing sketch-length imitations of both Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

Presented on August 17 as part of the Davenport Public Library's 3rd Thursday at Hoover's Presidential Library & Museum series, the virtual "best of" program Spotlight on the Famous Flour Sacks will recount Herbert Hoover's gift of several hundred decorated flour sacks for his work with the Commission for Relief in Belgium (CRB), a program established – under Hoover's direction – to provide food relief in war-torn Europe.

Held in conjunction with the Davenport venue's current exhibition Los Desconocidos: The Migrant Quilt Project, the "Quilts" episode of PBS' Craft in America will be screened on August 17, offering guests a chance to learn about contemporary quilters from diverse traditions as we celebrate the important role quilts have played in our country’s story.

With the presentation held in conjunction with the venue's current exhibition Endless Flight, Davenport's Figge Art Museum will welcome scholars and the exhibit's artist Edouard Duval-Carrié for the August 17 program Celebrating Haitian Art, a discussion of major collections that exist outside of Haiti, and how making them accessible to artists and scholars throughout its diaspora are important to the preservation of Haitian culture.

With their repertoire of nearly four decades including such top-10 Billboard smashes as "Love Song," "Signs," "What You Give," and "Mama's Fool," the soulful hard-rock and glam-metal musicians of Tesla headline an August 13 concert at Davenport's Rhythm City Casino Resort Event Center, the five-piece outfit continuing to tour with founders Brian Wheat on bass, keyboards, and piano, and Frank Hannon on guitar, keyboards, piano, organ, theremin, bass, mandolin, and harmonica.

Ever since the 2018 musical bio-pic Bohemian Rhapsody won four Academy Awards and grossed more than $215 million domestic and $875 million worldwide, Freddie Mercury and Queen have been hotter than ever – which is sure to be proven by the raucous crowd response on August 11 when Moline's Vibrant Arena at the MARK pays tribute to the iconic British rockers in the stage spectacle One Night of Queen performed by Gary Mullen & the Works.

Touring in support of their springtime release Skeletons, an album that Maximum Volume Music called "as muscular as any hard rock anywhere," the alternative-metal and post-grunge talents of Pop Evil headline an August 15 concert at East Moline venue The Rust Belt, the group's numerous chart-topping hits including "Trenches," "Deal with the Devil," "Waking Lions," and 2021's "Breathe Again."

Lauded by PopMatters as an alternative-folk singer/songwriter who "sits comfortably amongst the likes of Ray LaMontagne and Damien Rice with his smoky vocals and keen ability to strike an emotional chord," Florida musician Matthew Fowler headlines an August 15 concert event at Davenport's Raccoon Motel, the artist's most recent recording inspiring A Green Man to rave, "If you enjoy creative independent folk music at all, you owe it to yourself to check out The Grief We Gave Our Mother.”

Pages