Weekend Event Planner

These are the 12 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

The first weekend in November features a slate of events where everything is on equal footing. Each event on the below list should be as entertaining as the next, including new local theater, a simulcast of a renowned opera, a tour of a TV show that celebrates bad movies, cycling on open streets in Dallas, an illuminating art experience, and two music legends in concert together.

Below are the best ways to spend your free time this weekend. Want more options? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city's best events.

Thursday, November 1

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents Copland's Appalachian Spring
Dallas Symphony Orchestra will present one of the quintessential pieces of American music, Appalachian Spring, in concert with Beethoven’s elegant Piano Concerto No. 2 and Elgar’s beguiling Enigma Variations. The concert, presented four times through Sunday at Meyerson Symphony Center, will highlight pianist Jonathan Biss, under the direction of Miguel Harth-Bedoya.

Ochre House Theater presents Elwood
Elwood is a musical comedy filled with dazzling spectacle, dance, and original music that spins a tale of a desperate man. Elwood is a recluse who lives in the piney woods who tries to save baby Elvis, who has come under his charge, from nefarious people who want Elvis for themselves. Innocence of a child's love and trust and Elwood's determination to protect baby Elvis at all costs lead Elwood down a road he never expected to journey. The production will run at Ochre House Theater through November 17.

Friday, November 2

Dallas Opera presents Carmen simulcast
The Dallas Opera will present a free public simulcast of the penultimate performance of Carmen by Georges Bizet. The simulcast will take place at Klyde Warren Park, just down the road from the production at Winspear Opera House. The event will include a Carmen costume contest for people and pets, the Tom & Jerry cartoon "Carmen Get It!," trivia contests, and more. The opera will also have one final performance on Sunday.

Second Thought Theatre presents State of Mind
Second Thought Theatre will present State of Mind, an event celebrating Second Thought and gathering support for the award-winning theater company. The event will include entertainment by actor/singer Janelle Lutz, and an appearance by featured guest, director/choreographer Joel Ferrell, who has directed multiple Second Thought productions. The fundraising event will take place at Sammons Center for the Arts.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 30th Anniversary Tour
The Mystery Science Theater 3000 Live 30th Anniversary Tour will feature, for the first time in 25 years, original host and MST3K creator Joel Hodgson back in the red jumpsuit as Joel Robinson. Alongside new MST3Khost Jonah Heston (Jonah Ray), Joel and the Bots will bring new movies and all new riffs and sketches. There will be two separately ticketed screenings with different movies at Majestic Theatre.

Saturday, November 3

Dallas Bike Ride
Dallas Bike Ride is a closed-road, recreational bicycle event that celebrates bicycling as a form of healthy living, fitness, transportation, and fun. The event features a 20-mile car-free bike ride throughout Dallas. Participants can choose from the full 20-mile course or a shorter 11-mile course. The event will feature on-course music and entertainment, rest stops with snacks and water, and a Finish Festival at City Hall Plaza with music, entertainment, food trucks, and other activities.

Festival at the Switchyard
The City of Carrollton will present the 9th annual Festival at the Switchyard, featuring performances by Stone Temple Pilots, Vertical Horizon, Tonic, and more. In addition to free concerts, the festival at Historic Downtown Carrollton will feature a full day of fun, with live entertainment, rides and games, activities for children of all ages, and an array of food vendors and festival booths for shopping.

Dallas Summer Musicals Gala: An Evening with the Best of Broadway
Dallas Summer Musicals will present its annual gala, An Evening with the Best of Broadway. The event will feature actors Jane Lynch and Matthew Morrison, famed for their work in the musical-comedy television series Glee, renowned Broadway performer Shoshana Bean, and other surprise special guests. The event, taking place at the Music Hall at Fair Park, will raise funds for the non-profit Dallas Summer Musicals.

Aurora: Future Worlds
Immersive and engaging, Aurora is an expansive free public art event that transforms downtown Dallas into an open-air, urban playground of new media art. With installations of light, video, and sound presented in unexpected places, the sunset signals the transformation of the city into one of the nation’s largest outdoor exhibitions. The event centers on the iconic I.M. Pei-designed Dallas City Hall and stretches throughout Dallas.

Simple Minds in concert
Contrary to what you may think, the career of Simple Minds did not begin and end with their only No. 1 hit, "Don't You Forget About Me," from The Breakfast Club soundtrack. The Scottish duo is still releasing new music 40 years into their career, putting out their 19th album, Walk Between Worlds, this past February. They'll play at the Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving.

Sunday, November 4

Flying Steps presents Flying Bach
Flying Bach, which stars Germany’s four-time world champion Flying Steps breakdance troupe, interprets the music of Johann Sebastian Bach’s “The Well-Tempered Clavier." The show combines Bach’s classical masterpiece with modern electronic beats and clever choreography. There will be two performances at Majestic Theatre.

Stephen Stills and Judy Collins in concert
Fifty years ago, singer-songwriter Stephen Stills met singer-songwriter Judy Collins, and their tumultuous love affair would be immortalized by Stills with his composition “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.” The two icons of folk are touring for the first time together, playing music from their rich catalogs and their new album, Stills & Collins. They'll play at The Theatre at Grand Prairie.

Stephen Stills and Judy Collins will play at The Theatre at Grand Prairie on November 4.

Stephen Stills and Judy Collins/Facebook

Stephen Stills and Judy Collins will play at The Theatre at Grand Prairie on November 4.

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RIP, Frank

Frank Beard, drummer of legendary Texas rock band ZZ Top, dies at 77

Photo by Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images

He kept the tempo for the band’s biggest hits like 'Sharp Dressed Man,' 'Legs,' and 'Gimme All Your Lovin.'

NEW YORK (AP) — Frank Beard, the drummer for the Texas boogie-rock trio ZZ Top who kept the tempo for the band’s biggest hits like “Sharp Dressed Man,” “Legs,” and “Gimme All Your Lovin,’” has died. He was 77.

Beard was in hospice care when he died Tuesday, August 18 at his ranch in Richmond, Texas, near Houston, with family members at his side, according to publicist Bob Merlis. Band co-founder and guitarist Billy Gibbons, on tour with bassist Elwood Francis, hailed Beard in a statement.

“Today, Elwood and I lost a great friend and collaborator, and the world lost one of the most naturally innovative drummers and a great and true son of Texas. His signature backbeat was key to keeping ZZ on top. The band of which he was part for six decades is going to keep on keeping on as he had wished,” Gibbons said.

ZZ Top sold more than 50 million records and had six singles that reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart. Seven of their albums have been in the Billboard 200’s Top 10 and they earned three Grammy Award nominations.

“I’ve found the people I was meant to play with,” Beard says in the 2019 documentary ZZ Top: That Little Ol’ Band from Texas. “I never wanted to quit, and never wanted to get fired.”

Band's early days
Beard, from the East Texas town of Frankston, met Gibbons in a band called The Moving Sidewalks and later introduced bassist and vocalist Dusty Hill, a Dallas native, who had been in several bands with Beard.

The trio formed ZZ Top in 1969, naming themselves in part after blues singer Z.Z. Hill and influenced by the British power trio Cream and Jimmy Reed. They maintained their original lineup for more than five decades. Their signature look — long, bushy beards on Gibbons and Hill, and dark sunglasses for all — didn’t change much, either.

When Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards helped induct the trio into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2004, he joked: “These cats know their blues and they know how to dress it up. When I first saw them, I thought, ‘I hope these guys are not on the run, because that disguise is not going to work.’”

ZZ Top songs — with their sly and humorous lyrics — were popular in Hollywood, which used “Gimme All Your Lovin’” in “Happy Feet,” “Sharp Dressed Man” in “Evan Almighty,” “Legs” in “Air,” “Sleeping Bag” in “I, Tonya,” “Tush” in “Dazed and Confused,” “Mexican Blackbird” in “From Dusk Till Dawn” and “La Grange” in “Armageddon.”

“The best way to describe ZZ Top is we’re interpreters of a great American art form,” Gibbons told The Dallas Morning News.

Their debut release, “ZZ Top’s First Album,” came out in 1970. Their sound was described as a hybrid mixing elements of rock, blues and funk into a steaming-hot Houston stew. They called themselves a “Little Ol’ Band From Texas.”

Breaking through
Three years later, they broke through commercially with “La Grange,” a funky blues song on the album “Tres Hombres” that paid tribute to the Chicken Ranch, a brothel outside of the Texas town of La Grange that operated from 1905 until 1973 and was immortalized in the Broadway show and the film, “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.” Gibbons has ascribed the power of “La Grange" to its simplicity — just two chords and a Robert Johnson-inspired guitar solo.

The band went on to have such hits as “Tush” and “Cheap Sunglasses.” But their 1983 “Eliminator” — named after one of Gibbons’ custom cars — added more production elements, synthesizers and drum machines to their stripped-down sound and yielded the hits “Gimme All Your Lovin’,” “Legs” and “Sharp-Dressed Man.” The band toured with a Texas-shaped stage, live rattlesnakes and a longhorn steer.

Long beards weren’t always part of the band’s look. Gibbons said it happened by accident: In 1976, the trio took a long break and scattered. Beard went to Jamaica, Hill went to Mexico and Gibbons went to France.

“Although we were speaking by phone, this was pre-video phone. And Dusty and I did not know that we had gotten so lazy that we had decided to forget to shave,” Gibbons told The Tribune in San Luis Obispo in 2010. “So after three years we returned and showed up, and lo and behold here was this sort of wacky-looking image. And it just kind of stuck with us.”

A boost from MTV
The band’s rock-chic cool played well on the nascent MTV crowd and their videos, featuring models in short skirts emerging from one of Gibbons’ custom roadsters, became a mainstay.

They kept the beards, hats and cheap sunglasses in the video trilogy of “Gimme All Your Lovin’,” “Sharp Dressed Man,” and “Legs,” made with director Tim Newman.

“ZZ Top reveled in the humor and ridiculousness of it all, busting their synchronized dance moves and spinning their white-fur guitars. These guys always got the joke, at a time when other bands were still just nervously lip-syncing in front of brick walls,” Rolling Stone said in 2021.

In 2012, superstar producer Rick Rubin helped update the trio’s sound with the band’s comeback album, “La Futura.” The album landed at No. 6 on the Billboard chart, their highest position since 1990's “Recycler,” some 22 years previously.

Hill died in 2021.

In March 2025, the band announced via Instagram that Beard would temporarily step away from the band’s tour to tend to foot and ankle problems. Beard died weeks after ZZ Top called off its August 5 concert at the Hollywood Bowl due to his health issues.

Beard is survived by his wife, Debbie Meredith, and three children.

obituary celebrities zz top deaths

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