About Happen
Your Guide to Local Events and Gatherings
Happen is a free event calendar and discovery platform for the Hudson Valley, NY — connecting you to live music, art shows, film screenings, and community events across the region.
Happen is meant to make finding local events— from art and music shows to film screenings and community gatherings— as easy and fun as possible for everyone.
Happen is meant to make finding local events— from art and music shows to film screenings and community gatherings— as easy and fun as possible for everyone.
What Happen Does
Happen is a free, centralized event calendar and discovery platform for the Hudson Valley, NY region. It aggregates local events — live music, DJ nights, art exhibitions, film screenings, theater performances, community gatherings, literary readings, dance, and food events — from venues across Kingston, Hudson, Woodstock, Beacon, Saugerties, Catskill, New Paltz, Rhinebeck, and Bethel.
Rather than relying on scattered Instagram posts and outdated venue websites, Happen brings everything into one place. Users can browse events by date, category, or town, view them on an interactive map, save events to a personal itinerary, and export plans directly to their Google Calendar. The platform also features curated Editor's Picks, highlighting the best of what's happening each week.
Happen is built for Hudson Valley residents and weekend visitors alike — anyone who wants to discover what's happening nearby without digging through social media. It's also a free tool for local artists, musicians, venue owners, and event organizers who want their events to reach an engaged, local audience without paying for social media ads.
Happen's Purpose: Cultivating Community
The Hudson Valley is filled to the brim with creative culture and unique experiences. Shows in small venues and artist-run galleries, screenings, markets, readings, performances. The culture is everywhere. The problem is discoverability.
Too often, the best events are dispersed across many different sources— buried in Instagram stories, outdated websites, mass mailchimp emails, or word of mouth. Finding them feels accidental.
Happen was created to fix that. My goal is straightforward: to build a centralized, accessible resource to see all Hudson Valley events. A place where residents and visitors can reliably see what is happening, what is upcoming, plan ahead, and show up.
Drew Gillespie
Founder of Happen and Bobo
Why I Built This
This project was developed by Drew Gillespie, the founder of Bobo and now Happen.
"I built this because I would miss things I actually cared about. I live in the Hudson Valley and go to a lot of art shows and music performances. The best events were often hard to find or only discovered by accident. They were scattered across different places and poorly surfaced by algorithms. It wasn't working. I also wanted a way for people to find out about great events without having to rely on existing social networks, especially Instagram. And for people who have quit IG, it means they can still know whats going on.
I am an artist and a musician (and a product designer by day). I build tools that help people get past the noise and nonsense. Happen is allowing me to apply that to our local culture. Happen was built with the Hudson Valley in mind.
If you use it, please share it. If you host events, please add them. If it helps you go out more often, then it is working. Thanks for supporting."
Drew Gillespie
Founder of Happen and Bobo
Have a question or feedback about Happen? Send us a message— Contact Happen