The Sounds of September

10 NoMi concerts to add to your calendar

By Ross Boissoneau | Aug. 22, 2026

Labor Day may signal the traditional end of summer, but there’s still warm weather ahead and plenty to do, and that definitely includes music. While most summer music series are winding down, there are any number of concert venues offering folk and funk, country and classical, metal and musical memories.

The pace of locals’ summer is slower, true, but it’s not too late to tune in, turn it up, and drop in at venues far and wide. Welcome to the sounds of September.

1. Start the fun at the Charlevoix Jazz Session Weekend, Sept. 3-5. The festival kicks off on Thursday with Fog Horn Jazz Band, a local 15-piece big band, which performs classic big band charts and swinging favorites. On Friday, the five-piece Swingbone brings back the Great American Songbook and other blues, swing, and jazz favorites. The band features vocalist/trombonist Jim Grove and a quartet of top-notch Northern Michigan veterans. The festival concludes with Saturday night headliners Cat Daddy. The trio of guitarist Lee Heerspink, organist Clif Metcalf, and drummer Randy Marsh plays the bluesy, R&B-flavored organ jazz popular in the '60s and '70s, which never really went out of style.

2. How about a birthday bash? The global Coltrane 100 celebration in honor of the 100th anniversary of legendary saxophonist and composer John Coltrane’s birth is a year-long initiative. It features archival releases, historical home openings, and worldwide musical tributes honoring his monumental impact on music. That includes two shows Sept. 4 at The Alluvion by his son, saxophonist Ravi Coltrane. John Coltrane’s music blended a host of influences into his transcendent creativity and freedom. Trane is one of the touchpoints of jazz, and son Ravi “has admirably upheld his revered namesake yet also developed a distinct voice,” according to the authoritative website All About Jazz.

3. Go for Goh. Guitarist Goh Kurosawa blends flamenco, classical, Latin, Japanese music, and more into a musical stew that’s all his own. His Sept. 10 show at the Platform at Chalfonte Theatre in Elk Rapids is part of his ongoing Lovetap Tour, which has taken him from California to Japan, Myanmar, Brazil, Cuba, Mexico, and across the U.S. Known internationally as the “Musical Wakonyosai”—the Bicultural Music Samurai—Kurosawa fuses percussive fingerpicking, flamenco, and effects into a style that draws from world music, global jazz, folk, rock, and classical traditions. A typical Kurosawa set might move from a Bob Marley song to a Japanese folk melody to Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.”

4. It was 1964 when The Beatles first conquered America, and 1964 The Tribute takes audiences back to that magical time. The much-loved Beatles tribute band will play the Ramsdell in Manistee Sept. 11. The band formed in 1984, 20 years after the start of Beatlemania and strives for authenticity in its portrayal, including costumes reflecting The Beatles’ early period or replicas of the band’s Shea Stadium concert apparel from 1965. The group’s set list includes hits such as “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “Love Me Do,” “And I Love Her,” “A Hard Day’s Night,” and others, enough to fill two 45-minute sets.

5. America’s first hardcore punk band, the legendary Black Flag, will perform at The Venue in Cadillac Sept. 18. The group appeared in the midst of California’s punk scene in 1976 and its raw, aggressive sound was defined by blistering speed, heavy basslines, unconventional tempo shifts, and chaotic, atonal guitar solos by founder Greg Ginn. From early singers like Keith Morris to iconic long-term frontman Henry Rollins, the band’s vocal delivery was visceral, angry, and delivered with total commitment. The band is renowned for its intense and emotionally draining live shows. Today Ginn tours with three 20-somethings, still showcasing raw hardcore urgency.

6. Country’s next superstar Gabby Barrett is on her way. The singer, who finished third on the 16th season of the American Idol, appears at Odawa Casino in Petoskey. Sept. 18. Barrett’s debut single “I Hope” became the first top 10 Hot Country Songs debut by an unaccompanied female singer since October 2017. It became a top three hit on the Billboard Hot 100. “I Hope” headlined her 2020 platinum-selling debut album Goldmine. She’s garnered over 4.2 billion global career streams to date, and her accolades include the Billboard Women in Music Rising Star Award, Academy of Country Music’s New Female Artist of the Year, and the iHeartRadio Titanium Award.

7. Kevin Rhodes and his team of eight vocalists are performing “Laugh out Loud: A Comedy Cabaret” Sept. 18 and 19 at the Traverse City Philharmonic Center – MSUFCU Desk Drawer Foundation Hall. The Broadway-esque show combines witty asides, musical interludes, and more, with Rhodes at the piano rather than the podium. No teary-eyed ballads, no meaningful soliloquies, just fun and frolic, satire, and silliness. Rhodes says he enjoys these types of performances as they were among the first he did as a professional pianist. “The big difference is that back then I was the youngest person directing adults. Now I’m the oldest person in the room of performers.”

8. Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear, as Blues Traveler, Gin Blossoms, and Spin Doctors take us back to the 90s. The Sept. 19 show at Turtle Creek Stadium features three of the biggest bands of the alt/jam scene of three decades ago (really?). The three share an upbeat, guitar-driven radio rock style, with Blues Traveler and Spin Doctors famed for their improvisational jam-band stylings where Gin Blossoms lean more toward straight-ahead alternative power-pop. All three boast platinum sales and Grammy nominations, with Blues Traveler winning one for “Run-Around.”

9. What was once a term of derision is now simply used to describe the revived soft rock style popularized by the likes of Christopher Cross, Kenny Loggins, Michael McDonald, and others in the 1970s and 1980s. Relive those glory days and those glorious sounds with Yacht Rock Revue Sept. 20 at Great Lakes Center for the Arts at Bay Harbor. Hailed by Rolling Stone as the “world’s premier soft-rock party band,” it’s a chance to hear hits made famous by the likes of the above plus Hall & Oates, Steely Dan, Little River Band, and a host of others who parlayed melodic hooks, high production values, and stirring harmonies into chart-topping hits.

10. Will your heart go on? It will at “Celebrating Celine with Jenene Caramielo” Sept. 24 at the City Opera House. Caramielo channels the Canadian chanteuse in a show packed with hit after hit. Equally comfortable with pop music, showtunes, or an aria—she studied classical voice before graduating with a BFA in Musical Theater—Caramielo has received acclaim from various quarters. She’s shared the stage with Chicago, opened for the Beach Boys, and sung the National Anthem for Major League Baseball games. In this show she delivers Celine hit after hit, like “Because You Loved Me,” “My Heart Will Go On,” “I Drove All Night,” “The Power of Love,” and more.