Concerts & Events in Bethlehem

The cello-shaped Verizon Hall serenades eyes with mahogany accents under the 150-foot barrel-vaulted glass ceiling of the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts. With seats for 2,500 audience members, the hall immerses both spectators and musicians in the clarity generated by its premium acoustics, which absorb vibrations from the subway tunnel below with 225 rubber isolation pads and allow for precise tuning with retractable curtains and sound-reflecting panels. Seasoned jazz artist Branford Marsalis confirmed Verizon Hall's sound acumen when he told NPR it is "the best concert hall on the East Coast."

After practicing a new way to combine balls with baskets during the pro lacrosse clinic, both newbies and enthusiasts of the sport can kick back and enjoy the sights and sounds of the LXM Fan Experience. When the blades of grass settle, Wale will get them jumping again with tracks like his Billboard-charting singles "Pretty Girls," "Chillin," and more. By then, the crowd should be plenty amped for the main event—the LXM PRO Lacrosse Game. On the field, dozens of the sport's best players, including Kyle Harrison and Joe Walters, will split into two teams and go goal-for-goal and stick-for-stick as they play for sheer love of the game—inspiring the crowd's aspiring youth athletes with rocket-powered passes, last-second catches, and thrilling goals. There's no cap for today's Groupon, so feel free to bus in with a team or carpool in with a family.

Several decades of disparate architectural styles stand at the corner of 69th and Ludlow: an old-fashioned radio tower atop the Doric columns of a faux-classical cupola atop a streamlined marquee that broadcasts the year the Tower Theatre opened as a music venue: 1972. That's when it began helping introduce the world to such acts as David Bowie, Genesis, and Bruce Springsteen. Inside, red lights glow over an auditorium done up in the 1920s style of the movie palace that originally filled the venue, with marble pillars, Italianate archways, and an enormous light fixture that resembles an old film reel from the days before movies were beamed from computers into audiences' brains.

Competitors in the Professional Indoor Football League's United Conference since 2011, the Steelhawks prey on the opposition across the 50-yard pitch inside Stabler Arena. With a roster of gridiron stars, many of which were standouts at colleges across the country, the Steelhawks bring a fast-paced style of play to a football-crazed fanbase. The Steelhawks' mascot, Talon, regales fans in the stands during games with signature cheers and seminars on how to build structurally sound nests.

Hosting the evening's set, the historic Gramercy Theatre first opened its doors in 1937 and spent some 60 years as a movie palace and art house. Now wedged between two skyscrapers, it still retains some art-deco columns and flourishes striped into its façade. Inside, an intimate main room shares space with the eclectic Samsara Lounge where persian rugs and funky wall art imbue audiences with a rock 'n' roll spirit and inspire the spontaneous formation of nomadic tribes.

ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks hosts film and performing arts venues on four stories overlooking the dramatically illuminated blast furnaces of the former Bethlehem Steel Plant. On the first floor, the Frank Banko Alehouse Cinema projects independent, foreign, and documentary films on two full-size screens with 100 and 200 stadium-style seats. A full-service bar pours local Yuengling brews and other alcoholic beverages, and onsite chefs craft gourmet eats such as ham-and-brie paninis and beef sliders. Musical acts such as the Psychedelic Furs, Joan Osborne, and Rusted Root perform each weekend at Musikfest Café, where up to 1,000 concertgoers can spread across multiple levels of seating, or form a human pyramid to climb the exposed girders above the stage.