Performing a Moeller Nights concert on October 11, the Heligoats – what NPR called “a strange name for a guy strumming a guitar, but oddly befitting someone who stuffs his songs with so many sideways ideas and observations” – delivers acoustic indie rock courtesy of singer/songwriter Chris Otepka, whom NPR declared “writes songs that are brainy in the best way: clever without straining for cuteness, wry but never smug.”

For the group's first concerts of the 2018-19 season, the professional vocal ensemble the Nova Singers will travel Out of Darkness, Into Light on October 13 and 14, delivering Illinois and Iowa presentations that find noted composers wrestling with life’s darkest moments and exploring the uplifting powers of hope, light, and love.

An unforgettable tale of a ruthless race to power and the love affair that threatened to upend it, the historical drama Henry VIII: All Is True will be staged by verse-theatre troupe the Prenzie Players at Davenport's QC Theatre Workshop October 5 through 13 – the first area staging of ths 17th Century play in decades, and a work believed to be either the final or penultimate play written by William Shakespeare.

On August 26, theatre, film, and television scribe Neil Simon, at age 91, passed away after a legendary career that found him the recipient of the Pulitzer Prize, four Tony Awards, the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, and more combined Tony and Oscar nominations than any other writer in history. And from October 5 through 7, St. Ambrose University will celebrate the man's extraordinary career with its staging of Rumors, Simon's Tony-winning slapstick farce that the New York Post deemed “light, frothy, and fun.”