Telluride Bluegrass Festival is an annual music festival in

Telluride, Colorado Telluride is the county seat and most populous town of San Miguel County in the southwestern portion of the U.S. state of Colorado. The town is a former silver mining camp on the San Miguel River in the western San Juan Mountains. The first ...

hosted by Planet Bluegrass. Although traditionally the festival focuses on

bluegrass music Bluegrass music is a genre of American roots music The term American folk music encompasses numerous music genres, variously known as ''traditional music'', ''traditional folk music'', ''contemporary folk music'', ''vernacular music,'' or ...

, it often features music from a variety of related genres.

History

The town of Telluride had for many years held a Fourth of July Celebration which had its roots in the early mining days of Telluride, when miners would come from down from the mountains to party and meet up with old friends and meet some women. The celebration included a fireworks display operated by the local fire department. In 1972, the Telluride Ski Resort opened, and the Town of Telluride expanded the Celebration and advertised it widely in all the surrounding states. Among the new attendees were many who behaved badly, starting fights and causing damage; in response, the Town decided to call off the celebration for 1973. Scott Brown and a small group of friends convinced the Town to let them organized the 1973 event. The traditional rowdy events were replaced with games in the park for children, a picnic and barbeque. A stage was built at the far end of Town Park, and after a parade and an afternoon of family fun, the Fall Creek Boys, a local bluegrass band, took the stage to entertain the crowd, followed by the traditional fireworks display. Encouraged by the success of the 1973 celebration, the first Telluride Bluegrass Festival was organized in Telluride in 1974 by John Herndon, J.B. & Helen Matiotti, Kooster McAllister, and Fred Shellman, who played in the Fall Creek Boys. That year the festival attracted approximately 1000 participants. The festival became an annual event with attendance capped at 10,000. According to the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

, the 1980 performance was filmed by

Boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In c ...

public television and two CDs were made available. The management of the Bluegrass Festival has changed five times since its inception and is currently managed by Craig Ferguson of Planet Bluegrass."The Best Bluegrass of 2014"
''Pop Matters'', Steve Leftridge, 25 December 2014 Although it has been remodeled several times, the stage is still in the original spot, as are the concession stands. Since at least 2013, capacity has been set at 12,000 per day (48,000 total over the four days of the festival)."Bush, Musgraves, Keen Make for Eclectic Telluride Bluegrass Festival"
''Rolling Stone'', Kiran Herbert June 22, 2015 In 2013 the festival was impacted by flooding, but returned to its former condition in 2014. In 2015 the festival's official name is the Telluride Bluegrass and Country Music Festival. There was no festival in 2020.

Acts

Notable performers have included

TENACIOUS D Tenacious D is an American comedy rock duo formed in Los Angeles, California in 1994. It was founded by actors Jack Black and Kyle Gass, who were members of The Actors' Gang theater company at the time. The duo's name is derived from "tenacio ...

, Greenksky Bluegrass,

Tyler Childers Timothy Tyler Childers (born June 21, 1991) is an American singer and songwriter. His music is a mix of neotraditional country, bluegrass, and folk. He released his breakthrough album ''Purgatory'' in August 2017. Childers has released five stud ...

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Sam Bush Charles Samuel Bush (born April 13, 1952) is an American mandolinist who is considered an originator of progressive bluegrass music. In 2020, he was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame as a member of New Grass Revival. ...

Elvis Costello Declan Patrick MacManus Order of the British Empire, OBE (born 25 August 1954), known professionally as Elvis Costello, is an English singer-songwriter and record producer. He has won multiple awards in his career, including a Grammy Award in ...

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, Chris Daniels & The Kings, Bill Monroe, Nanci Griffith, Mark O'Conner,

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, String Cheese Incident,

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Sharon Gilchrist Sharon Gilchrist is an American musician, singer, composer, mandolin instructor and the sister of Troy Gilchrist, also a bluegrass musician. Biography Youth Raised in Southlake, Texas, a suburb of Dallas, Sharon Gilchrist started playing the m ...

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Alison Krauss and Union Station Alison Krauss & Union Station is an American bluegrass and country band associated with singer Alison Krauss. It was initially composed of Krauss, Jeff White, Mike Harman and John Pennell. Later additions included Tim Stafford, Ron Block, Ada ...

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Nickel Creek Nickel Creek (formerly known as the Nickel Creek Band) is an American bluegrass band consisting of Chris Thile (mandolin), and siblings Sara Watkins (fiddle) and Sean Watkins (guitar). Formed in 1989 in Southern California, they released six alb ...

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and the

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Peter Rowan Peter Rowan (born July 4, 1942) is an American bluegrass musician and composer. Rowan plays guitar and mandolin, yodels and sings. Biography Rowan was born in Wayland, Massachusetts to a musical family. From an early age, he had an interes ...

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Sara Watkins Sara Ullrika Watkins (born June 8, 1981) is an American singer-songwriter and fiddler. Watkins debuted in 1989 as the fiddler of Nickel Creek, the progressive bluegrass group she formed with her brother Sean and mandolinist Chris Thile. In addi ...

Noam Pikelny Noam Pikelny (born February 27, 1981, in Chicago, Illinois) is an American banjoist. He is a member of the group Punch Brothers and was previously in Leftover Salmon as well as the John Cowan Band. Pikelny is a nine-time Grammy Award nominee, win ...

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, Tim O'Brien,

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, Hot Rize, the Del McCoury Band,

Brandi Carlile Brandi Marie Carlile ( ; born June 1, 1981) is an American singer-songwriter and producer whose music spans many genres, including folk rock, alternative country, Americana, and classic rock. , Carlile has released seven studio albums. She has ...

, Powder Ridge,

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, Dierks Bentley, Norah Jones, Parker Millsap, and

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, to name a few. The Telluride house band consists of

mandolin A mandolin ( it, mandolino ; literally "small mandola") is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick. It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of 8 ...

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

Stuart Duncan Stuart Duncan (born April 14, 1964) is an American bluegrass musician who plays the fiddle, mandolin, guitar, and banjo. Life Duncan was born in Quantico, Virginia, and raised in Santa Paula, California, where he played in the school band. He ...

fiddle A fiddle is a bowed string musical instrument, most often a violin. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including classical music. Although in many cases violins and fiddles are essentially synonymous, th ...

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Edgar Meyer Edgar Meyer (born November 24, 1960) is an American bassist and composer. His styles include classical, bluegrass, newgrass, and jazz. He has won five Grammy Awards and been nominated seven times. Meyer is a member of the Telluride Bluegrass ...

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, and

Bryan Sutton Bryan Sutton is an American musician. Primarily known as a flatpicking acoustic guitar player, Sutton also plays mandolin, banjo, ukulele, and electric guitar. He also sings and writes songs. Biography Early career Sutton's grandfather and ...

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

. The 2007

Michelle Shocked Michelle Shocked (born Karen Michelle Johnston; February 24, 1962) is an American singer-songwriter. Her music has entered the ''Billboard'' Hot 100, been nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, and received an award f ...

gospel CD, '' ToHeavenURide'' was recorded live at the Festival.

Band contest

One of the features of the festival is a band contest. Twelve bands are given slots in the competition. Judges rate the bands and the top four go to the main stage to compete before the crowd. Past winners include: * 1985 - Blitz Creek * 1986 - Loose Ties (Runners-up Blue Plate Special) * 1988 - Titan Valley Warheads * 1989 - Powder Ridge * 1990 -

* 1991 - Meighan Edmonson Mittelmeier Band * 1992 - Sugarbeat * 1993 - String Fever * 1994 - Salt Licks * 1995 - Magraw Gap * 1996 - Cornbread Sally * 1997 - Ryan Shupe & Rubberband * 1998 - Floodplain Gang * 1999 - Pagosa Hot Strings * 2000 - Clear Blue * 2001 - Bearfoot Bluegrass * 2002 - South Austin Jug Band * 2003 - Hit & Run Bluegrass * 2004 - Burnett Family Bluegrass Band * 2005 - The Badly Bent * 2006 - Greensky Bluegrass * 2007 - Spring Creek Bluegrass Band * 2008 - Blue Canyon Boys * 2009 - The Hillbenders * 2010 - Nora Jane Struthers & the Bootleggers * 2011 - Run Boy Run * 2012 - BlueBilly Grit * 2013 -

Front Country Front Country is an American folk pop band founded in 2011 in San Francisco, California and now based in Nashville, Tennessee. The band consists of lead vocalist and songwriter Melody Walker, mandolinist Adam Roszkiewicz, and lead guitarist Jacob ...

* 2014 - Trout Steak Revival * 2015 - The Lil' Smokies * 2016 - Fireball Mail * 2017 - Sugar and the Mint : sugarandthemint.com * 2018 - Wood Belly * 2019 - Bowregard

Book

Dan Sadowsky, Telluride's Emcee for twenty nine years as "Pastor Mustard", has written a book about the festival. It is entitled ''Telluride Bluegrass Festival — 40 Years of Festivation''.Miller, Matt
"Telluride Bluegrass Festival 2014: Adding to four decades of stories"
''The Denver Post''.

References

External links