In a normal August, Apple Valley's weekend gravity pulls toward one address. Kelley Park at 6855 Fortino Street hosts the Music in Kelley Park concert series on Friday evenings, the food trucks line up, and residents who have lived here more than a season plan the last stretch of summer around it. This is not a normal August.
The concert series has spent the summer relocated because the amphitheater is being rebuilt, and the way that single construction project has redistributed the town's calendar tells you more about the next six weekends than any generic events roundup will. If you plan around Kelley Park by default, you will show up at a jobsite. If you plan around the reopening date, you will show up at the biggest single day Apple Valley has scheduled this year.
Where the music actually is right now
Due to construction in Kelley Park this summer, concerts will be held at Bogart's Entertainment Center from June 19 through July 31 and at Splash Valley on August 7, and the series concludes with a grand re-opening celebration concert in Kelley Park on September 26. That means the August 7 concert is not at Kelley Park and is not at Bogart's either. It runs from 6–8 p.m. at Splash Valley Water Park, located at 14421 Johnny Cake Ridge Rd, with Power of Ten performing, a band whose set list leans into Bruno Mars, Stevie Wonder, and Michael Jackson material.
Two practical consequences follow. First, the audience will be wet. A concert staged inside a working water park is a different night out than a lawn chair on the Kelley Park slope, and residents who have only attended the traditional format may want to know that in advance. Second, Bogart's Entertainment Center at 14917 Garrett Avenue has quietly served as the summer's default indoor venue, and it will keep doing so on rain dates and for the Arts Foundation's off-schedule concerts even after Kelley Park reopens.
The reopening concert itself is the payoff. On Saturday, September 26, the Urban Classic Earth, Wind and Fire tribute performs from 6–7:30 p.m. at the rebuilt Kelley Park. A Saturday slot, a shorter window, and a tribute act with broad appeal all signal that the Arts Foundation is expecting this to be the largest turnout of the entire series.
September 26 is the day to circle
Two separate events are landing at the same site on the same afternoon. The concert is one. The Fall Food Truck Festival on September 26, 2026 is a free, all-ages event that includes live music, activities, and a wide variety of food trucks with food and beverages for purchase. That is a doubling up: the city's fall food truck event and the Arts Foundation's amphitheater reopening are effectively co-hosted.
Here is what the day actually looks like if you are trying to plan around it:
| Time | What is happening | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Afternoon | Fall Food Truck Festival | Kelley Park, 6855 Fortino St. |
| 6:00–7:30 p.m. | Urban Classic (Earth, Wind and Fire tribute), grand re-opening concert | Kelley Park amphitheater |
For a resident, this is the difference between two errands on one Saturday and one very long, very well fed afternoon in the same square block. It also means parking will be a real question earlier in the day than most concert Saturdays require. Arriving at 5:45 p.m. as you might in a typical July has a different meaning when the food truck festival crowd has already been on site for hours.
What actually opened on Cedar Avenue
While the music was moving around, the dining corridor kept adding names. The most recent arrival is worth knowing by address, because it sits inside what the Chamber crowd has taken to calling Chicken Alley.
Chicken Salad Chick opened Tuesday, July 28 at 14658 Cedar Avenue in the Cedar Marketplace shopping center, in the former Flooring Expo by Carpet King building next to Buffalo Wild Wings and Five Guys. The opening marks the Atlanta-based chain's expansion into Minnesota as its 24th state, and the company now operates more than 340 locations nationwide. The Apple Valley location is the entire state's first.
The ownership detail is the one worth carrying with you. The Apple Valley restaurant is owned by Mike and Mandi Boogerd, longtime Apple Valley residents who have called the community home for 23 years; before opening the restaurant, Mike worked as a product owner for Optum, while Mandi spent her career in special education. A first-in-state franchise that is owned by two people who already lived on the same side streets as their customers is a different proposition than a corporate rollout parachuted in from out of town. If you are the sort of resident who tracks who actually owns what on Cedar, this one belongs on your list.
The indoor counterweight at Fischer Marketplace
The other reason the concert relocation has not felt as disruptive as it could have is that Apple Valley picked up a serious indoor dining destination earlier this cycle. Revolve Hall opened in the building at 14889 Florence Trail in Apple Valley offering five different eating experiences, in what had previously housed Pizzeria Social and Curiouser Coffee.
The five concepts under one roof are not interchangeable, and each one is doing something specific:
- Curiouser Coffee & Conservatory offers a wider brunch menu and light alcoholic drinks like mimosas and martinis on the counter-ordering side.
- Square Cut Pizza serves a variety of both Detroit-style deep dish and tavern-style pizzas, as it does at its current Farmington location.
- Whiskey Inferno serves steaks and craft cocktails, billed as delivering a dining experience that pairs smoky, rich flavors with creative drink offerings.
- In summer, Revolve Hall adds the Wanderer Bar on the outdoor patio.
The context matters. The food hall is the brainchild of Tony Donatell of the newly renamed Wondrous Collective restaurants, which has locations in Eagan, Farmington, Savage and soon Lakeville. Wondrous Collective is comprised of 15 brand concepts across seven locations in the south metro. Fischer Marketplace is the south-metro flagship of an operator who has been building out one town at a time for years. That is different from a national chain landing in a shopping center.
A practical read on the two together: Cedar Marketplace is where the quick, first-in-state and franchise arrivals cluster. Fischer Marketplace is where the sit-down, patio, cocktail hour lives. If you have been defaulting to one for both jobs, you have been missing the other's better version of the second job.
The Zoo does not slow down in September
The Minnesota Zoo at 13000 Zoo Boulevard runs a full shoulder-season programming slate that residents often overlook because the zoo is easy to file under "we already went in July." A partial read of what is actually scheduled:
- Wanderlight Trail Family Nights ran on Wednesday, July 29, 2026 at the Minnesota Zoo, and the trail programming continues on selected evenings through the shoulder season.
- Wild Workouts: Zumba runs on Tue, August 18, 2026 from 6:30 p.m. at 13000 Zoo Blvd, and Wild Workouts: Yoga runs Tuesday, August 11, 2026 from 6:30 p.m. at Llama Trek.
- Beastly Bash 2026 runs Friday, September 18, 2026 from 6:00 p.m. at the zoo.
That September 18 date is the one that changes plans. It sits one Friday before the Kelley Park reopening, which means the last full weekend of Apple Valley's summer season effectively spans two anchor events at two different addresses eight days apart. If you were going to pick one big Friday night and one big Saturday, that is your pair.
Everything else that is worth knowing this month
A few smaller items that residents keep re-asking about:
- The Apple Valley farmers market runs Saturdays through October 31, 2026, 8 a.m.–1 p.m., at 7100 W 147th Avenue. The Municipal Center parking lot host, run by the Saint Paul Growers Association, means the season goes deep into fall, well past when most residents assume it closes.
- The 5th annual Apple Valley Fall Festival Craft & Gift Expo runs Saturday, September 26, 2026 from 10:00 a.m. at 14452 Hayes Rd, adding a third event to that already loaded Saturday.
- Brick & Bourbon at 14883 Florence Trail sits directly across from Revolve Hall in the same Fischer Marketplace cluster, which is worth knowing if the Revolve Hall waitlist runs long on a Saturday night.
How to plan the next six weekends
If you use one takeaway, use this one. The Apple Valley calendar for the rest of the summer is not organized around Kelley Park. It is organized around a return to Kelley Park. Every other event is either bridge programming (Bogart's, Splash Valley, Revolve Hall's patio, the zoo's Wild Workouts) or setup for the one Saturday when the amphitheater comes back online with a tribute act, a food truck festival, and a craft expo stacked on the same date.
Plan Friday August 7 for a wet concert at Splash Valley. Plan Friday September 18 for Beastly Bash. Plan Saturday September 26 as a full day, not an evening, because three events are sharing the calendar and the parking. Everything in between is time to try Chicken Salad Chick, work through the five concepts at Revolve Hall, and pick up produce at the Municipal Center market on Saturday mornings.
Residents who have lived here through several summers will recognize this pattern as a one-year exception. The amphitheater comes back, the calendar returns to its usual center, and the version of Apple Valley that runs on the standard Music in Kelley Park rhythm will be back in June 2027.
For neighbors thinking further ahead about their next move within the community, Michael Finstad is available for a free consultation and home valuation. Schedule a conversation when the timing is right for your family.
