An all-star troupe is celebrating an iconic Beatles album at the Norton Center

When The Beatles released their self-titled, double-record opus commonly referred to as the White Album in November 1968, the rock ‘n’ roll journey of Todd Rundgren was already underway. A month earlier, he and the other three members of the Philadelphia-rooted band The Nazz had issued their first album. It contained a song, full of scholarly melodicism and melancholy, that Rundgren would re-record four years later, making him a pop celebrity in the process. It was titled “Hello It’s Me.”

“Our whole idolatry of the Beatles was starting to break down a little bit back then,” said Rundgren, 71. “We were discovering other artists, but also there was also the fact The Beatles had stopped touring. There was always this kind of open question whether they were going to break up.

“The White Album was, for many of us, the beginning of the end. Even though we didn’t have a whole lot of knowledge when the album first came out about how it was made, the process made it apparent that the band was starting to fracture and that various people were thinking of doing their own thing.”

Now with a career that has touched on progressive, pop, guitar-drenched rock, electronica, a capella music, bossa nova and more, Rundgren has returned to the beginning – not to The Nazz, but to The Beatles.

This weekend, he will be part of an all-star troupe that also includes Christopher Cross, The Monkees’ Micky Dolenz, Chicago alumnus Jason Scheff and Badfinger’s Joey Molland for a program titled “It Was Fifty Years Ago Today: A Tribute to the Beatles’ White Album.” It will offer modern takes on works from the famed Beatles recording along with tunes from each of the featured artists’ separate careers.

“One of the great things about doing these kinds of collaborative tours is that the full weight of it doesn’t fall on any one person’s shoulders,” Rundgren said. “I’m splitting the burden up, so that makes it a lot more fun.”

Also look for another, perhaps less familiar name onstage when the tour makes its way to the Norton Center for the Arts in Danville – Gil Assayas. When Rundgren reassembled his ‘70s/’80s band Utopia last year for a series of reunion concerts, he found himself in urgent need of a replacement keyboardist once veteran member Ralph Schuckett dropped out due to health issues. The Israeli-born Assayas was recruited.

“We like to brag that he was our discovery,” Rundgren said. “But it’s likely he would have been discovered at some point. Despite the fact he wasn’t born until long after The Beatles broke up, Gil just has a natural aptitude for picking up the material.

“When I sent him some of the music last year that we were going to do, I neglected to tell him that the original Utopia had three keyboard players, so he learned all three keyboard parts. He just assumed that was one guy and learned them all. That kind of enthusiasm, for me, is a bonus.”

Despite an extensive career as a pop performer and producer (he produced Molland and Badfinger for their most hit-heavy album, “Straight Up,” in 1971 but hasn’t worked with him since), tours utilizing Rundgren as a sort of hired gun are hardly new. In fact, he has toured numerous times as a member of Ringo Starr’s All-Starr Band beginning in 1992. But when the discussion began as to which artist on the current White Album tribute tour would do which Beatles song, Rundgren was quick to claim a classic.

“I had already done ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ in so many contexts that when this tour came up and it got down to divvying up the material, I just said, ‘Dibs on that. That’s mine.’ I played it with an orchestra at the Hollywood Bowl. I did it on the George Harrison tribute album (2003’s “Songs from the Material World: A Tribute to George Harrison”). I was definitely laying claim to that one.”

The “It Was Fifty Years Ago Today” tour (to be precise, the White Album was released just under 51 years ago) caps off what has been a prolific 2019 for Rundgren. It included the publication of his autobiography, “The Individualist,” and an extensive tour highlighting a career retrospective of his own music.

“I tend to go through sorts of phases and fascinations. I do records that are obviously learning experiences both for me and my audience and then, ideally, something is gleaned and boiled down that will then be part of the way that I work from that point on. Sometimes it’s me trying to learn something new. Sometimes it’s me trying to recover things that I already knew, but had kind of left behind.

“Every once in a while, though, an exciting little project comes up like this fall tour. Long as your name is on the radar for these things, it makes life really interesting.”

“It Was Fifty Years Ago Today: A Tribute to the Beatles’ White Album”

Featuring Todd Rundgren, Christopher Cross, Mickey Dolenz, Joey Molland and Jason Scheff

When: 7:30 p.m. Sept. 29

Where: Norton Center for the Arts Newlin Hall, 600 W. Walnut St in Danville

Tickets: $52-$75

Call: 859-236-4692

Online: nortoncenter.com