Things to Do in Cedar Rapids This Week: September 16–20, 2026
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How can nominating a company win you a private party, too?
Scroll to the bottom to find out. On the way, you’ll meet a first-ever Iowa performer—and the band Cedar Rapids hasn’t seen in more than 20 years.
Three Things We’d Actually Leave the House For
Orchestra Iowa: Masterworks I — New World Symphony
Saturday, September 19 · 7:30 PM · Paramount Theatre · Tickets
Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man, Gershwin’s Piano Concerto in F with Michelle Cann, and Dvořák’s New World Symphony: Orchestra Iowa isn’t easing into its new season.
Doubt: A Parable
Friday–Sunday, September 18–20 · CSPS Hall Black Box · $25 · Tickets
A principal suspects a charismatic priest of wrongdoing, but proof never arrives cleanly. John Patrick Shanley’s Pulitzer-winning drama lives in the dangerous space between conviction and certainty.
The Final Downtown Farmers Market
Saturday, September 19 · 7:30 AM–Noon · Downtown Cedar Rapids · Free · Details
The last market of the season doesn’t need a grand finale. It has more than 200 vendors, early-fall produce, baked goods, flowers, and the familiar pleasure of running into half the city before breakfast.
The Main Event
BrewNost gives Friday night a passport
Friday, September 18 · VIP 5:30 PM / General Admission 6:30 PM · National Czech & Slovak Museum & Library · 21+ · Tickets
BrewNost turns the museum’s riverside campus into an international beer hall: unlimited food and drink from local restaurants, breweries, and distilleries alongside international beer, wine, live music, auctions, and a raffle for a trip to Prague.
General admission is $75, designated-driver tickets are $50, and both include the food. This isn’t a stop-by-later kind of night. It’s the Friday plan.
Bring an appetite and let Czech Village do the hosting.
The Weeknight Move
Lee Ross: One-Man Psychedelic Funk
Wednesday, September 16 · Doors 7 PM / Show 8 PM · The Ideal Theater & Bar · $16 + fees · 21+ · Tickets
Lee Ross builds a full-band sound from keyboard, saxophone, flute, and live looping, stacking every beat and groove in real time. Nothing’s pre-recorded, and no two sets land exactly the same way.
He’s shared stages with George Clinton, Guster, and G. Love & Special Sauce. His first-ever Iowa appearance happens in a room small enough to watch the whole thing take shape.
Plus One Thing You Might Miss...But Shouldn't Overlook
Global Graze: Small Bites, Big Change
Thursday, September 17 · 5:30–8 PM · The Olympic South Side Theater · Tickets
Feed Iowa First pairs local chefs with produce grown through its farm-business incubator, then turns the results into street-food-inspired bites with roots all over the world.
It’s dinner with a point: a celebration of local flavor and 15 years of fighting food insecurity, tucked into one of the corridor’s best gathering rooms.
Looking Ahead
Earshot returns to Cedar Rapids after twenty years
Wednesday, September 23 · 8–10:30 PM · The Olympic South Side Theater · Tickets
The band behind “Get Away” and “Wait” plays its first Cedar Rapids show in more than two decades. Heartsick and SaintSix open. If those Earshot songs still live somewhere in your muscle memory, The Olympic is where they get loud again.
The Ideal’s 2026 Sweepstakes
THE WORKLOAD DIDN'T GET SMALLER. THE PARTY BUDGET DID.
Your team has been asked to stretch further, adapt faster, and keep delivering—even as budgets tighten and the extras disappear.
Nominate a company. If that company is selected, it wins a private party at The Ideal—and you win a separate private party of the same value for yourself.
Two winners. Two private parties. $3,000–$6,000+ in value—each.
Enter by October 1, 2026.
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