By John Lehndorff<\/p>\n

It was the best of bluegrass festivals. \u00a0It was the worst of bluegrass festivals.<\/p>\n

If you liked your bluegrass leavened with rock, jazz, reggae, country, classical, blues, folk and more it was a glowing American musical celebration, not to mention a ton of fun. \u00a0If you liked your bluegrass traditional, you were left wondering if you had landed on the wrong planet.<\/p>\n

Which is to say that everything was absolutely normal at the 15th Telluride Bluegrass Festival, which took place last weekend in the Town Park of that southwestern Colorado town.<\/p>\n

From the first fingerpicker ragtime licks of Pat Donahue’s guitar on Thursday through more than 20 acts until the last blues-funk chord of Little Feat on Sunday, the 1988 edition was a textbook example of how Telluride has earned its status as one of America’s best music festivals.<\/p>\n

The secret to Telluride’s power as an event lies not in the hills of old Kentucky, but in the late 1960s. \u00a0This is largely a baby boom festival, started 15 years ago by some young, long-haired hippies who brought in young, long-haired performers and a similar audience. \u00a0All may now have settled down and gotten grayer, but that same sensibility still informs the music.<\/p>\n

At the Telluride Bluegrass Festival, one was treated to country music by Michael Martin Murphey and Texan Robert Earl Keen. \u00a0The sound of Louisiana found powerful expression in Beausoleil’s Cajun dance music and Little Feat’s gumbo funk. Unmistakable ethnic influences from Ireland to Poland and the Middle East found expression in Mark O’Connor’s world-class fiddling and David Grisman’s “jazzgrass” compositions.\u00a0 \u00a0A clearly classical influence shone in Edgar Meyer’s bass variations, Nancy Blake’s cello and Dimitri Vandellos’ guitar wizardry. <\/strong><\/p>\n

And as always at the core was the blues.<\/p>\n

Somehow it seemed perfectly appropriate when white blues legend AI Kooper walked on\u00b7 stage late Friday night to join a 12-man\u00b7band that included Boulder’s Chris Daniels and David Bromberg in singing an absolutely electrifying version of Muddy Waters’ “Honeybee.”<\/p>\n

And yet throughout, bluegrass was never far away. There is genuine reverence among the players for the form, even if they don’t want to play it strictly. You could hear the reverence in the modern bluegrass of Hot Rize and the Nashville Bluegrass band; in the “Southern chamber music” of stellar guitarist Norman Blake and his wife Nancy; and in John Hartford’s fiddle-strong String Band.<\/p>\n

You could hear it when, first thing Sunday morning, 20 folks – people like Tim O’Brien, Peter Rowan, John Cowan – gathered onstage for what can only be described as a spiritual but strictly non-religious gospel set.<\/p>\n

Joining in was the a cappella group The Wayfarers, a talented group or Boulder singers that had wowed the crowd in a series or energetic between the acts sets.<\/p>\n

All these Influences could be heard in beautifully fused form at critical points in the weekend.<\/p>\n

In their 14th Telluride appearance, New Grass Revival revived. \u00a0They delivered a particularly strong set emphasizing new material that blended rock, bluegrass and jazz elements with strong R & B singing. \u00a0The fusion could also be heard In Peter Rowan’s Free Mexican Air Force, which played everything from his “Midnight Moonlight” to a reggae\/southwestern set including Bob Marley’s “No Woman, No Cry.”<\/p>\n

Easily the jazziest moment of the weekend came when the David Grisman Quartet offered one of its best sets in years, full of complicated, swinging rhythms. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Afterwards. Grisman lamented the fact that “the jazz purists think I’m playing bluegrass and the bluegrass purists think I’m playing jazz,” adding that Telluride is one or the few places where both come together.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At the Telluride Bluegrass Festival, one was treated to country music by Michael Martin Murphey and Texan Robert Earl Keen. The sound of Louisiana found powerful expression in Beausoleil’s Cajun dance music and Little Feat’s gumbo funk. Unmistakable ethnic influences from Ireland to Poland and the Middle East found expression in Mark O’Connor’s world-class fiddling and David Grisman’s “jazzgrass” compositions. A clearly classical influence shone in Edgar Meyer’s bass variations, Nancy Blake’s cello and Dimitri Vandellos’ guitar wizardry. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":760,"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426\/revisions\/760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vandellos.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}