I recently made my 13th annual pilgrimage to Telluride for the 37th Telluride Bluegrass Festival. As always there was a mind blowing medley of bluegrass and other great acoustic (and some not so acoustic) acts. While I always love the seeing the standard cast of characters (i.e. Sam Bush, Tim Obrien, Béla Fleck, Jerry Douglas, YMSB, etc..) this year seemed to have an abundance of great acts playing the festival for the first time. Josh Ritter, Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros and Mumford & Sons blew me away.

All this said, I have to say the absolute highlight of the festival this year was the illustrious rockabilly goddess Imelda May. Hailing from the rockabilly shores of Dublin, Ireland, Imelda and her band have a great traditional sound. It was as though the band stepped out of a time machine from the 50′s hidden behind the stage. Her presence and vocal chops were matched by her band that were each masters of their respective instruments. The drummer was one of the most energetic percussionists I’ve seen in recent memory.

I think it was quite apropos to have a rockabilly band at the bluegrass festival. Both styles have very close recent ancestry. In many ways they are both red headed step children (or perhaps kissing cousins) of traditional country/folk/blues music.

Another ACL 2008 spoil was the Belleville Outfit. They’ve got sort of an old time bluegrass swing sound that is chock full of roots goodness. Not to mention their fiddle player is drop dead gorgeous! I can’t wait to see them in a more intimate setting.

I love it when two musicians from completely different musical backgrounds come together and play music. This performance by Sam Bush and Jorma Kaukonen from High Sierra Music Festival on June 30, 2000 could be what influenced Jorma to record Blue Country Heart which is a masterpiece of roots blues and country featuring Jorma, Sam, Bela Fleck, Byron House and Jerry Douglas. The picking in this set is mind blowing and the synergy between Jorma and Sam is amazing. For some of the tunes, Sam plays slide on what he refers to as a ham can which is a National dobro mandolin. Jorma accuses Sam of being a “very disturbed man” for playing such an instrument. The rhetoric between these guys is hilarious. This is one of the favorite live shows in my collection and I hope you find it as much fun as I did. Its a 256kbps MP3 rip of a lossless soundboard and the sound quality is A+. Enjoy!

Jorma Kaukonen & Sam Bush

6/30/00

SBD>Tascam DA-30MKII>digital out>Sek’d Prodif plus soundcard >
Sound Forge>CD Architect>Plextor 8/20

Recording:
Ken “Easy Ed” Edwards
CD Mastering & Seeding:
Ken “Easy Ed” Edwards

01. intro by Wesley Robertson
02. Hesistation Blues
03. the roots of Rock and Roll and Bluegrass
04. Crossroads Blues
05. if you have any questions
06. Sally Where’d You Get Your Liquor From?
07. deeply disturbed
08. How Long Blues
09. my middle name
10. Mann’s Fate
11. favorite Jerry tune
12. Sittin’ on Top of the World
13. (applause)
14. 99 Year Blues

Related Posts:
[mp3] Janis & Jorma – The Typewriter Tapes

Cherryholmes is a family bluegrass band featuring two generations of smokin’ pickers. Based out of Arizona, Cherryholmes has performed on the Grand Ol Opry and received the best new bluegrass band of the year at last years IBMA awards. They’ve got five albums and are currently recording on Skaggs Family Records label. Check them out:

The Bluegrass Blog has posted an excellent documentary about The Infamous Stringdusters called Four Days of Infamy. Produced by String Theory Media, Four Days of Infamy gives insight into the daily life of the ‘dusters as it follows them through a tour of Colorado this past March. You can stream the documentary in its entirety. Check it out!

Last month, the 34th annual Telluride Bluegrass Festival was amazing and hosted one of the best lineups in years including Los Lobos, Alison Krauss, Peter Rowan and Tony Rice Quartet (featuring the angelic Sharon Gilchrist), Guster, Greensky Bluegrass, Jackie Greene, Yonder Mountain String Band, Sam Bush, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, Chris Thile, Sparrow Quartet , The Infamous Stringdusters, Crooked Still and tons more.

The Peter Rowan and Tony Rice Quartet was what I might consider to be the best set I’ve experienced in 10 consecutive years of going to Telluride Bluegrass. I love Peter Rowan, but what he’s done is to create the ultimate musical atmosphere for Tony Rice to showcase his jaw dropping guitar. And I also think that Sharon Gilchrist is one of the most amazing new mandolin players on the scene. I’ve seen her play with Uncle Earl and Mary and Mars and its so great to see her up on the stage with two Bluegrass gods!


Jackie Greene was another highlight of this year’s festival for me. He’s such an amazingly talented young songwriter and he reminds me of a cross between Tom Petty and Bob Dylan. The combination of his songwriting and musical sensibility make him one of my favorite new acts. If you check him out, give his album Gone Wanderin’ a listen.

Crooked Still was another highlight of the festival that caught me completely by surprise. Their cello player, Rushad Eggleston is out of this earth doing things that I didn’t know could be done with the cello. Not to mention the sweet smooth vocal stylings of singer Aoife O’Donovan

I was delighted to see the Leftover Salmon reunion on the Town Park Stage. They were billed as Drew Emmitt, Vince Herman and friends but nobody was fooled, this was the first time that LoS has played the festival in three years so it was quite a treat and caused me to wax nostalgic a little

If you were at the festival and want to relive some of the fun or even if you weren’t, you
stream or download Bela Fleck and the Flecktones entire set at archive.org. You can also stream or download Yonder Mountain’s set from Telluride Bluegrass 2007.

I was having so much fun that I only got to take a couple photos and none were of any of the performers. Fortunately flickr has got you covered!

Check out this very cool homemade video that the boys from the south of Austin put out. What a cool Beck cover. Its as if the song was written to be played on bluegrass instruments which doesn’t surprise me because Beck has very traditional influences.

I was reading over at the Fretboard Journal blog about how Tony Rice has hurt his back and has had to cancel some shows. That is a real drag; feel better soon Tony! They also had a little mention of an amazing looking bluegrass documentary called Bluegrass Journey which features Tony, Del McCoury, Rhonda Vincent, Tim O’brien, Peter Rowan, Jerry Douglas, Nickel Creek and others. Below is a clip from Bluegrass Journey that features Tony playing Shenandoah, what a beautiful piece:

Gotta love some high lonesome Motorhead sounds from the Hayseed Dixie boys!

Well only David Lee Roth on Bluegrass, but it is a Van Halen tune (Jump). I love how the banjo player transposed the guitar solo to the banjo. David Lee Roth looks like a Senator or something in this video, he’s lost his edge. The band in this video is really good.