Arts & Culture

This weekend, the PPL Center in Allentown hosts Cirque du Soleil's "Corteo," the tale of a clown imagining his funeral as a spectacle of incredible carnival acts.

More than 350 young students throughout the Greater Lehigh Valley participated in a mural painting event at Lehigh Valley Children's Center in Allentown on Thursday.The completed mural will appear on an exterior wall of the new Da Vinci Science Center in Allentown. The center is slated for a May 22 opening.

Mayfair Festival of the Arts, the Memorial Day weekend festival, will return to Cedar Crest College for a sixth year May 24-26.

Lehigh University's Dr. Larry Snyder has taken a lifelong love of word puzzles to the next level by becoming a New York Times-grade crossword constructor.

“Corteo,” which premiered in Montreal in April 2005, has performed before 10 million spectators in 20 countries on four continents. It will perform six shows March 28-31 at the PPL Center in Allentown.

Take a look at stories that ran throughout the week of which we are most proud, had a profound impact on readers or that you might want to look at again.

Plush, which has had the Top 40 Mainstream Rock chart hits “Hate” and “Left Behind,” will perform at Maingate nightclub, it was announced.

Local nonprofit Lehigh Valley Girls Rock's adult camp is set to return this year, finally returning the full slate of programming since the pandemic began.

Devon Koch, a 2022 Liberty High School graduate, is a sophomore at Kutztown University and helped student broadcasters win gold for an on-air pledge drive.

The event, which will feature at least 17 local, national and international distillers and distributors, will be 1-4 p.m. (11 a.m. for premium access) June 9 in Musikfest Café at the ArtsQuest Center.

The Monster Jam truck show, which features trucks 12 feet tall and 12 feet wide, sitting atop 66-inch-tall tires and weighing at least 10,000 pounds, will have sessions at 1 p.m. and 7 p.m. July 13 and 1 p.m. July 14.

Drew Holcomb and The Neighbors will perform at 8 p.m. Sunday at Musikfest Cafe at ArtsQuest Center in Bethlehem.

Old Crow Medicine Show has spent 25 years exploring the depths of classic folk, country, and Americana, all the while making tunes distinctly their own. On April 13, the band is coming to the State Theatre as part of the tour in support of their latest album, Jubilee.

Let’s Sing Taylor — A Live Band Experience Celebrating Taylor Swift, which calls itself “the ultimate tribute to the music of Taylor Swift,” will perform June 15 at the center, at 301 W. Mill St.

The Allentown Film Festival is now in its second year and will feature short films and Q&A sessions with filmmakers.

Actor/comedian Patrick Roach, who plays the character Randy on “Trailer Park Boys,” will bring Randy's Cheeseburger Picnic to Maingate Nightclub on Saturday, June 1.

Violinist Diane Monroe and New Jersey-based dance group Nimbus are among the scheduled performers set for April at Zoellner Arts Center at Lehigh University.

Megan Campbell and her son Finley have just released their first storybook, "Home is Where the Heart is," which features some of the young man's favorite spots in Easton.

Blues Traveler, which also in the 1990s had five gold and platinum albums and whose 1990 hit "Run-Around" spent 49 weeks on the Top 100, will perform Aug. 24. Also on the show will be Big Head Todd and The Monsters, who had the Top 15 hits “Bittersweet,” “Broken Hearted Savior” and “Resignation Superman.”

A $900,000 grant to ArtsQuest and the City of Bethlehem will improve pedestrian infrastructure around the nonprofit's Banana Factory complex on Third Street.

A new event, Steel City Smokeout, will be held Saturday, July 20, on PNC Plaza on the SteelStacks campus in conjunction with Bethlehem restaurant Nick’s BBQ.

Moravian University students wrote and directed the productions as part of their Master of Fine Arts thesis projects. Their performances at Touchstone Theatre — spread out through April and starting this week — will explore disability, self-worth and creativity.