Michigan Travel · Grand Rapids
Things to do in Grand Rapids this weekend: a Frida Kahlo ballet, The Notebook’s last shows and music at Meijer Gardens
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Grand Rapids Ballet opens a ballet about painter Frida Kahlo this weekend, and the touring musical The Notebook plays its last shows downtown.
Broken Wings, Grand Rapids Ballet. The company stages Broken Wings at the Peter Martin Wege Theatre at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, then repeats that schedule Oct. 23–25, according to the ballet’s website. Choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa built the piece around Kahlo’s life, including the bus accident that injured her and her marriage to painter Diego Rivera. Peter Salem’s score draws on Mexican folk music. The same program includes A Dreamer, Artistic Director James Sofranko’s ballet about physicist Stephen Hawking, set to music by Philip Glass and Ludwig van Beethoven. The company lists a run time of 1 hour, 35 minutes with one intermission and warns that the production includes mature themes, among them a miscarriage. Buying at the theater box office avoids ticket fees, the ballet says.
The Notebook, DeVos Performance Hall. The musical based on Nicholas Sparks’ novel closes its Broadway Grand Rapids run Sunday. Remaining shows are at 7:30 p.m. Friday; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday; and 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday, according to Broadway Grand Rapids. Grand Rapids Magazine lists tickets starting at $56.
Autumn Weekends at Meijer Gardens. Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, 1000 E. Beltline Ave. NE, has live music in its amphitheater from 2 to 4 p.m. both days, with the Bahar Ensemble on Saturday and the Music Medicine Collective on Sunday. The concerts are included with general admission and free for members, according to the gardens, which take cards only.
Friends of the Library Book Sale. The used-book sale runs at the Grand Rapids Public Library’s Main Library from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday, the library’s events calendar shows.
John Ball Zoo’s Zoo Goes Boo and Sunday’s Grand Rapids Marathon, which closes West Side streets, are also on this weekend’s calendar.
Sources:
Grand Rapids Ballet, “Broken Wings,” accessed Oct. 15, 2026, https://grballet.com/broken-wings/
Broadway Grand Rapids, “The Notebook,” accessed Oct. 15, 2026, https://grandrapids.broadway.com/shows/the-notebook/
Grand Rapids Magazine, “Eight Things to Do in Grand Rapids This Weekend,” Oct. 14, 2026, https://www.grmag.com/entertainment/eight-things-to-do-in-grand-rapids-this-weekend/
Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, “Autumn Weekends Live Music with The Music Medicine Collective,” accessed Oct. 15, 2026, https://www.meijergardens.org/events/autumn-weekends-live-music-with-the-music-medicine-collective/
Grand Rapids Public Library, events calendar, accessed Oct. 15, 2026, https://www.grpl.org/events/
Photo: Wilfredor, “Don Quijote de La Mancha, Teresa Carreño Teather.jpg,” 2013, Wikimedia Commons, CC0 (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/), cropped and color-adjusted, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Don_Quijote_de_La_Mancha,_Teresa_Carre%C3%B1o_Teather.jpg
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