Alison Krauss & Union Station last released a studio album in 2011. Paper Airplane was a chart-topping record, and then — nothing — for fourteen years. When Arcadia finally arrived in March 2025, it confirmed what anyone who had seen this ensemble live already suspected: they had been waiting for the material to be right. The Arcadia 2026 Tour brings that record to The Palace Theatre Albany on Wednesday, July 22 at 7:30 PM.
About Alison Krauss and Union Station
Krauss signed to Rounder Records at 16 out of Decatur, Illinois, and the project that became Union Station has been a Grammy-winning enterprise ever since. The New York Times has described the band as transforming “the sound of modern bluegrass by constantly drawing new subtleties from old-time roots” — which is as concise a summary of their particular gift as you are likely to find in print.
Arcadia, the ensemble’s eighth studio album, arrives with one notable roster change. Longtime guitarist and vocalist Dan Tyminski has departed to pursue a solo career; in his place, Russell Moore — co-lead vocalist from IIIrd Tyme Out — brings a baritone that Folk Alley’s Henry Carrigan identified as central to the album’s character. Moore’s voice on “The Hangman,” Carrigan wrote, conveys “desolation and sorrow, anger and regret.” The rest of the touring lineup — Jerry Douglas (Dobro, lap steel, vocals), Ron Block (banjo, guitar, vocals), Barry Bales (bass, vocals), and Jacob Burleson (multi-instrumentalist) — surrounds Krauss’s fiddle and lead vocals with the kind of precision ensemble playing that has always distinguished Union Station from the festival circuit’s louder alternatives.
The album earned three 2026 Grammy nominations: Best Bluegrass Album, Best American Roots Performance for “Richmond on the James,” and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical. Carrigan’s full assessment in Folk Alley was that “Arcadia shimmers with an incandescent beauty, and every song on Alison Krauss & Union Station’s new album is a little slice of perfection.”
The Venue
The Palace Theatre, at 19 Clinton Avenue in Albany’s Capital District, is the right room for this. As a theater in the heart of downtown, it provides the kind of acoustic intimacy that rewards a band whose stock in trade is nuance — soft dynamics, breath-held quiet passages, the space between notes. The Arcadia material, slow and purposeful by design, will land differently in a seated theater than it would on an amphitheater lawn.
Tickets
Alison Krauss and Union Station perform at The Palace Theatre Albany on Wednesday, July 22, 2026 at 7:30 PM. Tickets are available via the link below. For venue information, visit palacealbany.org.