This Weekend: Kingston's UPAC Hosts a Jazz Summit for the Ages

Every so often a booking comes along that's less a concert than a gathering, and Kingston gets one this Sunday. But let's not skip the days that get us there.

Friday, August 7, UPAC warms up its 1927 house with Brit Floyd, the Pink Floyd tribute juggernaut, filling the region's biggest seated room with lasers and The Wall. Same night in Woodstock, Bearsville Theater goes the other direction with soul-rocker Neal Francis and Pearl Charles, while over in Kingston, Tubby's throws its Freakout Spot Summer Bash. Loud, ornate, or sweaty — pick your Friday.

Saturday, August 8, splits high and low beautifully. In the Woodstock woods, Maverick Concerts — the country's oldest continuous summer chamber series, in its 1916 music chapel — hosts the acclaimed Escher String Quartet. That same night, Tubby's keeps the other end of the spectrum honest, and Bearsville's Neal Francis bill carries over the soul. You could, in theory, do Escher at dusk and a DIY room by midnight. We'd respect it.

Then Sunday, August 9, the weekend earns its headline. UPAC hosts "Celebrating Jack DeJohnette: Sound Travels," a benefit honoring the Woodstock-based drum titan — and the guest list reads like a jazz fever dream: Pat Metheny, Bill Frisell, Ravi Coltrane, David Murray, Don Byron and Will Calhoun. That is not a lineup you assemble for money. That's the one you assemble for love, for a giant of the music who happens to live up the road. In the region's flagship theater, it's the ticket of the summer.

The same Sunday keeps giving at both ends of the scale: Jarod Clemons plays the intimate Colony in Woodstock, and back at Tubby's, Brooklyn drone-rock lifers Oneida land with Kinski and Spreaders. And if you started early, note that Indiana roots-rockers Houndmouth played Basilica Hudson up in Hudson on Aug 4 — a great room, though technically a drive past the core valley.

Why it matters: a mid-size valley doesn't usually get a jazz summit and a string quartet and a drone-rock triple bill in one weekend. This one does — because the players actually live here. Sunday, get to Kingston. Some rooms you show up for. That one, you show up to.

Sources: Chronogram: HV August live music; Chronogram: 11 Essential Summer Concerts; Tubby's calendar; Bearsville Theater summer lineup