The Friday Night Concert Series and Downtown Saturday Night continue their run this weekend as part of the Summer of the Arts initiative. And Saturday we have the Saturday Night Free Movie Series at the UI Pentacrest too. Iowa City has lots of fun things to do outdoors in the summer time. Mark your calendars, the first weekend of July is one of the highlights for the year with the a 3 day event – The Iowa City Jazz Festival. Watch out for that. Hopefully by then the weather will have settled down a bit. This inclement weather is starting to get old on me. I’m used to grey skies in Europe – I expect more from Iowa!

Schedule for Summer of the Arts June 17, 2011 + June 18, 2011

The weekend kicks off with the Friday Night Concert Series. FUNKMA$TER ft. Katharine Ruestow + Big Funk Guarantee will be performing Friday June 17, from 6.30pm – 9.30pm.

Where? At the Weatherdance Fountain Stage outside the Sheraton Hotel, downtown Iowa City. In the event of rain, the location changes to the Chauncey Swan Parking Ramp.

As part of the Saturday Night Downtown Series Rae and the Honeybees will be playing on Saturday June 18, from 6.30pm – 9.00pm.

Where? Same place as the Friday Night Concert Series – Weatherdance Fountain Stage outside the Sheraton. Same rain location too.

The Saturday Night Free Movie Series is not at the Ped Mall, it’s at the UI Pentacrest, in front of MacBride Hall. Dirty Dancing is the movie this week and is scheduled to start at sundown, approximately 8.45pm.

The Summer of the Arts season is in full swing in Iowa City. Dodgy weather or not. Right now the forecast for the Friday Night Concert Series and Downtown Saturday Night for the coming weekend looks promising. Hopefully it stays that way. We’ve had some hefty storms this week, it would be nice if mother nature gave us a respite for the weekend.

Not only do we have live entertainment lined up this weekend. There’s also a showing of that great movie Inception scheduled for the kick off of the Saturday Night Free Movie Series on the UI Pentacrest. Here’s the full schedule for Summer of the Arts this weekend:

Schedule for Summer of the Arts June 10, 2011 + June 11, 2011

The weekend kicks off with the Friday Night Concert Series. The Beaker Brothers will be performing Friday June 10, from 6.30pm – 9.30pm.

Where? At the Weatherdance Fountain Stage outside the Sheraton Hotel, downtown Iowa City. In the event of rain, the location changes to the Chauncey Swan Parking Ramp.

As part of the Saturday Night Downtown Series Roommate will be playing on Saturday June 11, from 6.30pm – 9.00pm.

Where? Same place as the Friday Night Concert Series – Weatherdance Fountain Stage outside the Sheraton. Same rain location too.

It’s a great location for these events. The Ped Mall has so much to offer. It’s a great place to hang out and kids love it too. They can climb on the equipment on the playground or have a ball playing with water on the Splash Pad. (I don’t know of any kids who don’t like to play with water!) And when you get hungry there are restaurants galore to choose from…

The Saturday Night Free Movie Series moves down the road a bit. That’s not at the Ped Mall, it’s at the UI Pentacrest, in front of MacBride Hall. The first movie of the season is Inception and is scheduled to start at sundown, approximately 8.45pm. (I needed to think about that for a minute, but it actually makes perfect sense that they wait until the sun goes down before they start the movie).