Woodstock Land Conservancy Presents Celebration of Zena: An Immersive Forest Experience A Free Public Evening of Sound, Art, and Reciprocity at Maverick Concerts, September 25

WOODSTOCK, NY—On the evening of Friday, September 25, 2026, the historic Maverick Concerts will fill with something it was built for: the sounds of the forest. Woodstock Land Conservancy presents Celebration of Zena: An Immersive Forest Experience, a free public event rooted in a year of deep listening to the Zena Highwoods. The evening opens with a panel discussion on community art and science in local stewardship, with Miranda Javid of WLC, illustrator Zoe Keller, and sound artist Zaneta Sykes. Then the hall goes quiet, and the forest speaks. Sykes will premiere Invitations from the Land: the Zena Highwoods, an eco-ritual of reciprocity drawing on their Filipinx traditions of singing to land in offering. Audiences will move through a year of forest soundscapes recorded on the solstices and equinoxes in the Zena Highwoods, woven together with projected wildlife illustrations by Keller. As the evening deepens into the autumnal night chorus, the community will be invited to sing back. The event also marks the release of Sykes’ album documenting the forest through a year of seasonal recordings, writings, and illustrations, created in partnership with WLC with guest contributions from Keller and Javid. Signed copies will be available. Winterberry tea served. The Zena Highwoods is a 625-acre forest straddling the towns of Woodstock and Ulster, and one of the most ecologically significant landscapes in the region. Celebration of Zena is both an artistic homecoming and a love letter to a place worth fighting for.