Anybody listening to music anywhere on Martha’s Vineyard but at the Union Chapel in Oak Bluffs on Friday night was listening in the wrong place.

Which means all but about 50 people on the Island. For that was the total crowd which turned up to hear the Elio Villafranca trio’s two shows at 7 and 9 p.m.

And that is sad thing, as much as the man who brought the trio, broadcaster, documentary maker and general jazz aficionado Jim Luce, tried to make light of it before the trio’s second show.

“You,” he said, scanning in the tiny audience, “are the hippest people on Martha’s Vineyard.”

Truth be told, they did not look so hip. But they sure looked happy, once the effervescent, kinetic, Cuban-based music began.

It was so good. Not just small-venue-on-Martha’s-Vineyard good, but world class good. The sort of good that would have left an audience deeply impressed in Havana or New York or at any major music festival in between.

The musicianship of each of the three men, Elio Villafranca on piano, Junior Terry on bass and Henry Cole on drums, was staggering, and the interplay between them was a joy made all the more wonderful because the audience sat almost among them. There was no stage; they were set up on the floor in front of the old chapel’s cross, pipe organ, and U.S. flag.

It was so good that after it was over, the audience lingered on the steps outside to talk to each other about it. One man reeled off a string of the names of famous performers he’d seen, Miles Davis among them.

“That was better,” he concluded.

Yet hardly anyone saw it, or saw Saturday night’s world premiere of the new Emilio Valdez Cuban quartet, another blinder of a show. Hardly anyone knew about it.

And that is a publicity problem which will have to be fixed, if more great musicianship is not to go widely unheard this summer. For Mr. Luce has a whole series planned, under the banner World Piano Summit.

In July and August he will bring a bunch of world class, piano-based music, some classical, some jazz to the Vineyard for a series of concerts at the old Whaling Church in Edgartown. Last weekend’s performances were a sort-of teaser.

To the series in a minute; first a bit about Mr. Luce.

He grew up in Falmouth, became a broadcaster, specialized in jazz and ultimately made a big name for himself as a promoter and maker of documentaries on performers including Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Count Basie and the aforementioned Miles Davis.

“This is my 40th year presenting music,” he said yesterday. “I’ve been in broadcasting my whole life and I produce the Caramoor Jazz Festival. This is my 16th year.”

He also believes strongly in taking music to the people, which grew from his own indulgence in what he calls “salon music.”

“We have a 40-seat concert hall in our house in Easton, Pennsylvania, and once a month we bring one of the world’s great musicians to come and play in our living room. We’ve been doing it four years and it’s a fantastic way to build community through music. And it’s the way music used to happen.

“So the mission, if you will, is to bring world class music to people in their environment, so they don’t have to go from Martha’s Vineyard to Carnegie Hall or to Boston.

“I grew up in Woods Hole and I was at one time an announcer on the predecessor of WMVY, WVOY, which actually went off-air back in the seventies. I’ve always appreciated the rich cultural landscape of Martha’s Vineyard, its diverse appreciation of the arts. And I know a lot of New Yorkers I live and work with in my other home, who go there. I thought ‘let’s give the Vineyard some music.’

“I believe that music heals. It’s a force of beauty in the world. And that’s what interests me — making beauty and sharing it.”

No doubt he is disappointed so few shared his first offering.

“I need seats filled,” he said, “not the way it was over the weekend.”

So, to the series, which will take place over three days from July 14 to 16 and another three from August 25 to 27.

It is called the World Piano Summit.

“The piano,” said Mr. Luce “is the consummate orchestra. The ratio of the math is always 88 to 10, and the variable is the sum total of the life experience of the person playing the piano.”

Although his primary interest is jazz, the range of the shows is wide, as a taste of the July roster shows.

The July 14 performance is entitled Classics from the Continent, featuring Simon Mulligan playing Beethoven. Mr. Mulligan debuted at 19 with the Royal Philharmonic orchestra, made his first CD a year later with Yehudi Menuhin and has recorded Beethoven sonatas released on Sony masterworks.

“He’s one of the foremost interpreters of Beethoven and he’s also a jazz musician,” said Mr. Luce.

The next night, it’s Junior Mance, who’s been playing notably since 1947. With Lester Young for two years from 1949. With Cannonball Adderley, Charlie Parker, Coleman Hawkins, Dinah Washington and Dizzy Gillespie. With him here will be Aaron Goldberg.

And the next night is Cuban night, with Elio Villafranca back, and joined by Chuchito Valdez, another of the Cuban greats. He hails from Havana and inherited, the reviewers say, not only his father’s famous name, but also his brilliance.

“What we’re about is bringing just the greatest musicians in the world in their genre,” said Mr. Luce.

Which might sound a tad hyperbolic. Unless you were among the fortunate few last Friday night.