As with any seasonal facility in the northeastern part of the country (Tanglewood in Lenox, Mass, or Bethel Woods, downstate, also come to mind) — it’s always a bit sad when SPAC (The Saratoga Performing Arts Center, for you out-of-towners) shuts down for the year– you know it will be late May or early June of next year before we are back for more rousing concerts in the outdoor air of its fine amphitheater. There are, however, numerous year-round venues within a half-hour to an hour from here, and other local spots to keep us amused through the dark months.
The Palace in Albany (corner of Clinton & North Pearl), and Proctor’s Theater on State Street in downtown Schenectady are both venerable institutions of show business, dating back to vaudeville at least, and both are cool places to see music in a theatrical, not high-tech, setting. Each seats perhaps a thousand to two thousand attendees, no more than that. The Egg down near The Capital in Albany, is a New York State-owned facility, providing another intimate auditorium setting of a more modern variety, with great sound and visuals from all seats. Peter Lesser, a Saratoga resident who runs the programming there, books perennially amazing performances of class acts in a year-round fashion–Joan Osborne recently, John McLaughlin a few years back, Bella Fleck’s various aggregations on multiple occasions, lots of great sax players and singers, string-players, from folky to funky.
For wilder rock/rap/punk/metal excursions appealing to the WEQX-&-younger faction, there is the Upstate Concert Hall (formerly Northern Lights) in Clifton Park– as heavily booked year-round as most Greenwich Village clubs of yore. Michael Franti & Spearhead, and The Tragically Hip are two performances in the past year I wish I’d caught there, but they are frequently sold out. Minus The Bear will be there soon, I believe. Fat Boy Slim to Wu Tang Club members show up there now and then, which you don’t often get in suburbia, off Exit 9 of the Northway, but it’s there: a scant 15 miles from Saratoga’s downtown, southern section of the County.
There are also occasional bigger shows popping up at The Glens Falls Civic Center (15 quick miles north of Saratoga), and The Times Union Center in downtown Albany (35 quick minutes south), the largest indoor venue in the area. Locals know that they can keep track of Ticketmaster and Live Nation websites and find most if not all of the big touring acts that way– and if they are really ambitious they can venture a bit further to Hudson, NY, Northhampton, Mass, or several of the area’s college campuses to catch good music during the non-summer seasons…. I hope to see Medesky, Martin and Woods, for instance, down at St. Rose College’s Massry Hall in Albany, first week of October.
The most comprehensive listings of all of the above music– the old-fashioned way of checking– are published weekly in METROLAND, published out of Albany, but
covering the entire region– distributed on Thursdays, free. (As an aside, I was working for a similar but more tame weekly called “Kite”, in Schenectady, as a delivery guy for awhile, 1978, when it slowly morphed into METROLAND around that time. I remember
the collators were always listening to The Stones’ new record that year– two ubiquitous hits: Miss You, and Shattered.)
Saratoga itself could really use a concert hall that serves as an off-season destination as well as maybe a sports performing complex as well– a scaled-down version of the T-U Center in Albany, mentioned above. When my son Miles once had to create a theoretical business plan for a senior project, he and I made an interesting (but so-far, mythical) model of such a place, situated on South Broadway in location I won’t yet reveal, which would serve such a purpose. We blocked out a site for the arena and beaucoup parking, tried to figure out how many seats we could create without going overboard, and did some primitive calculations on how many concerts a year the place would have to attract to make it viable year-round… a lovely fantasy– a place for both bigtime basketball and live music…right at our doorstep… perhaps some indoor tennis, or boxing or MMA acts thrown in for good measure… without having to drive to Albany or Glens Falls. This would take Saratoga Springs to the next level as a 4-season destination, and create traffic problems, no doubt, proportional to the extent it was successful in drawing even more people into town. At this point, alas, just a distant fantasy, but if anyone out there wants to discuss the possibility of fulfilling this vision,
call me at my real estate office sometime! Perhaps just in writing this, I will inspire the people at the already-built downtown City Center to use their beautiful facility for more musical purposes, though I’m not sure what the acoustics would be in their large, open convention rooms.
But in the meantime, on a smaller scale, there is the downtown nightlife, which already gets plenty of promotion on this website as a whole, beyond my modest blog. One place I will be frequenting more often this fall and winter which was not here in year’s past, is
DRUTHERS, a fairly new brew pub on the west side of Broadway which has already proven itself a great spot for music, mostly jazz, latin music, and tasty funk. I have barely begun to sample its flavorful brews, but the one night I was there, quaffing some terrific fresh lager dubbed Smoky Mist or something to that effect, I heard the local group
Sensamaya play there. Flute and conga-based standards and originals, great stuff…
and my musical fanatic friend Dave, keyboardist in the band Pangaea, among other things, tried to entice me to come out to see the phenomenal sax-player Brian Patenaude and his band play there last weekend, but alas I was committed to heading in a different direction, though I hope to catch them if they return. DRUTHERS is just north of the now-being-revamped Adelphi Hotel, and just south of the former Border’s bookstore. It has, like many Saratoga bars and eateries, the capacity to have outdoor music on its patio area, but also to move the music inside to a roomy interior when the weather gets too chill for exterior amusement.
I will be hoping to catch some more music– without leaving town– before the year is out at Bailey’s Cafe, The Putnam Den (just heard that BLUES TRAVELLER will be there on Oct. 15th!!), and perhaps Saratoga’s City Tavern in the coming month’s, in addition to Druthers. Gaffneys usually has some kind of live music, from folk and blues, covers to originals, albeit inside once it’s too chill for the outer garden to fill.
The Icehouse around the corner, and Dangos, and Sperry’s, might be checked for live music as well, all within a block of each other, And for small ensemble jazz (and blended scotch) aficianadoes, I would be remiss if I did not mention 9 Maple Ave, where Mike the barkeep has been sustaining serious musicians for years now. Cocktail/jazz piano and chanteuses (or chantii??) can also be heard at One Caroline Street, upper corner near Broadway, and across the street at The Paddock Lounge, you may find live music down below street level as well, though it was as crowded as Studio 54 years ago, last I knew.
There are a few other, non-alcohol based, venues I should mention in Saratoga as well.
My son Daryn just attended a Sunday afternoon show at The Music Hall on the third floor of City Hall, a combination of acoustic guitar by a wandering minstrel named Miche Fambro, and African/world music by “Ensemble Congeras”– you never know where something good is going to pop up, or when. The Skidmore campus, and the historically- relentless Caffe Lena on Phila Street are other places you should check when looking for local entertainment in the aftermath of tourist season. For gigs specific to our smaller context-city one could pick-up Saratoga Today (a weekly also), or The Saratogian, for complete listings. Or, if you’re like Daryn, (not me), you’ll find out on Facebook.
More area music and Saratoga stories coming up soon…stay tuned. I think I’ll be writing about The Adelphi Hotel next, off the music scene for a minute, into 20th century history.
Take care till then,
Wayne Perras
wperras3@gmail.com