Arts exhibitions and performances have returned in full swing to West Michigan. This season, there’s absolutely no shortage of concerts, symphonies, plays, musicals, ballet, visual arts and beyond. 

• visual art
• dance
• jazz
• Classical Music
• Theater

In the public imagination, making good art requires two gifts: inspiration and talent. Inspiration is unpredictable and can strike at any time, so keep a sketchbook handy. 

• Art classes
• Ghosthouse Fine Art Studio + Workshop
• Ghosthouse

In a performance captured in 1966, Judy Collins stands on an unadorned stage, guitar in hand. Her hair, cut simply, is dark; her dress is white.

• jazz
• St Cecilia Music Center
• Classical Music
• Touring Music
• Judy Collins
• The War & Treaty
• The Lone Bellow

The 16th annual RADFest, the Midwest Regional Alternative Dance Festival hosted by Wellspring/Cori Terry & Dancers, kicked off in downtown Kalamazoo with “Michigan Made Concert”, the first of seven performances offered throughout the weekend celebration of dance that also includes master classes, film screenings, panel discussions, and networking opportunities.

• dance
• RADFest
• Midwest RADFest

Whatever one might expect from Peter Pan, the Grand Rapids Ballet delivered it—and more—in their tremendous production of this utterly magical contemporary storybook ballet. True to the original 1902 story written by J.M. Barrie about the boy who refuses grow up, it’s a tale particularly suited to being told largely without words and primarily through movement.

• dance
• Grand Rapids Ballet
• Peter Pan

Is Dial M For Murder at Farmers Alley Theatre a thriller or a mystery? It’s certainly a very appealing melodrama, as Director D. Terry Williams points out in his program note. 

• theatre
• Farmers Alley Theatre
• theatre reviews

It begins before it begins. On a stage artfully designed to look like a combination of a Valentine’s Day card, a red-light district, and a boudoir, a well-dressed man emerges, staring out into the audience. Beautiful women in minimal dress bend, gaze, and arch.

• DeVos Performance Hall
• Broadway Grand Rapids
• theatre reviews
• Theater

At seven, maybe eight, Meghan Distel saw Annie. “I felt this connection to the actors,” she said. “Looking up at that stage, I could see myself.” It kindled in her not only the excitement shared by so many other children who saw that show, but an understanding: she would make theater part of her life.

• theatre
• Broadway Grand Rapids
• Web Exclusive
• Performing Arts
• Meghan Distel

First staged in October of 1600, Jacopo Peri’s “Euridice” is the oldest surviving opera. Peri, in sympathy with the majority of Florence’s musicians and men of letters, found inspiration in the spare and resonant stories of the ancient world.

• opera
• Grand Rapids Opera
• Eurydice

Six years and an enormous amount of man hours have gone into the Muskegon Museum of Art expansion, which was completed in late 2024. In February, the museum (which has not shut down in the interim) will usher attendees into its expanded space.

• visual art
• Muskegon
• muskegon museum of art