In 2017, the last three days of September and the first of October brought an unexpected surprise. The All Senses Festival debuted its multi-media enterprise last year with more than 20 artistic performances and was held at Rozz-Tox, the Rock Island Brewing Company (RIBCO), and the Figge Art Museum. Though smaller in scale compared to other regional festivals, in particular Iowa City’s Mission Creek, All Senses had, judging by the number of the acts, its own Homeric air to it.

Described by Rolling Stone as blending “highbrow smarts with down-home stomp,” the Denver-based rockers of The Yawpers perform a September 19 Moeller Nights concert in support of the band's 2017 release Boy in a Well, a concept record ConsequenceOfSound.net praised for its “complex and ambitious tale” and “muscular, unpredictable rockabilly tracks.”

Lauded by BluesRockReview.com for his “harmonica gymnastics with vocal theatrics” and the frontman for the Grammy-winning outfit Blues Traveler for more than 30 years, John Popper plays a special September 24 concert at Davenport's Redstone Room, sharing the musical gifts that led Alternative Revolution to deem the 51-year-old “an elder statesman of the jam scene … and he certainly earned the title at a young age.”

A two-day celebration of a most dexterous musical instrument, the area's inaugural Shockingly Modern Saxophone Festival – taking place at Augustana College's Larson Hall September 14 and 15 – will treat lovers of the sax to master classes, workshops, discussions, and recitals, with the fest's guest artist, renowned saxophonist/composer Nick Zoulek, described by the Wall Street Journal as “stunningly virtuosic, whatever the genre.”