Music

Cheap Trick, which was to be the opener for a show by rock band Heart, was announced Friday as the replacement for Heart as grandstand opening-night headliner at 7 p.m. Aug. 28. It will be joined for the show by another 1970s hit rock group — Blue Oyster Cult, best known for its 1976 hit "(Don't Fear) The Reaper."

It's been two weeks since rock band Heart canceled its opening-night headline concert at Allentown Fair, and it looks like the fair is set to announce a replacement.

For the first time, the two-day festival will feature a barbecue competition, along with 11 blues performers. It will take place Friday, July 19 and Saturday, July 20 at SteelStacks.

Through this month, the symphony is offering a 10% discount on tickets to its popular Holiday Pops concert on Dec. 21 and Repertory Dance Theatre's "Nutcracker" on Dec. 7-8, both at Miller Symphony Hall at 23 S. 6th St., Allentown.

Michael W. Smith, who has won three Grammy Awards and 45 Dove Awards and has been inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame, will perform at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 21.

ArtsQuest is holding a one-day sale that eliminates those pesky price-pumping fees on eight of the 11 headline shows at the SteelStage venue. But the sale ends at 11:59 p.m. today, July 12.

The 37th Annual Blueberry Festival runs Saturday and Sunday, with live music, food, kids activities, outdoor games, and of course, blueberries. New this year is the Blueberry Tavern Tent, serving centuries-old tipples for tasting and taking.

The Dickies and The Queers will perform at 7 p.m. Nov. 2 at Maingate Nightclub, 448 N. 17th St. Allentown.

South African rockers Seether, who had the chart-topping songs “Broken (with Amy Lee),” “Remedy,” “Fake It” and “Country Song,” will team up with Skillet, which has had 25 Top 10 Christian chart singles, 12 of which went gold or platinum, to play the event center at 6 p.m. Sept. 21.

Brett Scallions, the original singer of 1990s hit band Fuel, will perform an acoustic solo show at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, July 13, at Signature Event Center, 137 Erin Lane, Brodheadsville. Tickets, at $30, remain available at www.TicketWeb.com.

Clarice Assad, a Grammy-nominated composer, vocalist and pianist, has joined the Allentown Symphony as the Miller Symphony Hall's 2023-24 composer in residence.

The community chorale's founder, Ed Milisits passed away in January 2022. The chorus is gearing up for its December performances.

The local rock band will celebrate their album, "Maybe This is It" at 7 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 20.

Pierson has performed in various configurations, including bands, trios, duos and solos. Her Heather Pierson Acoustic Trio hit No. 2 on the Folk Radio Charts in 2015 with its song "Still She Will Fly" and No. 1 on the Folk Radio Albums chart with its 2017 full-length debut, "Singin’."

"Heart is the Hero" makes for the band's eighth studio album. The group will be sharing selections from that and more during the incoming fall tour, with shows throughout the Midwest, East Coast and Europe.

The entire movie — all 2 hours and 48 minutes of it (more about that later) — is footage of a performance of Swift's Eras Tour concert filmed at the tour's last U.S. dates at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles in early August.

Rainy weekends have put a damper on attendance at fall festivals in the Lehigh Valley.

On Thursday the new concert movie 'Taylor Swift The Eras Tour' will open at ArtsQuest's Frank Banko Alehouse Cinema, bringing Taylor Swift back to the Lehigh Valley in film version, but she has a long, real history in the area, as well.

The proposed legislation would prohibit sales of tickets that an agency doesn't actually possess, and prevent such organizations from using logos or images of venues with which they aren't affiliated.

The 13th Oktoberfest opened Friday night at SteelStacks in Bethlehem. The German-inspired festival will be held Friday, Oct. 6 through Sunday, Oct. 8, and Friday, Oct. 13 through Sunday, Oct. 15. It features polka and other music, a variety of beer, food and entertainment.

The Large Flowerheads will perform on a stage erected near home plate on the field at Coca-Cola Park in Allentown at 6:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 7. General-admission seating will be in the stadium bowl, on blankets on the field or in lawn chairs in designated areas.

Hip hop, widely believed to have started in the Bronx borough of New York City, quickly spread to the nearby Lehigh Valley, says organizer Michael A. Frassetto.