Gonna Get Baked In Telluride
Baked In Telluride is back! Festivarians have been grinning at its play on words and eating its baked goods for years . . . until last year, when we had to get by without it as the result of a fire. A year later, it’s back, and better than ever. I’m eating a cake donut with chocolate icing as I type this. Good stuff.
The weather report (you can see the sky in the picture) predicts a clear, hot day for the first day of the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. So getting baked in Telluride today potentially has 3 meanings (you can guess the other one, I’m assuming). The weatherman will tell you that it’s 75 degrees up here at 8700 feet, but if it’s a clear day, that will feel like 85 or 90 come early afternoon.
Travel to Telluride took all day yesterday, but we had the treat of flying into Montrose with Bela Fleck and The Flecktones in the seats right behind us. We tried not to goob out too much over the opportunity to meet these greats, but I’m pretty sure I failed. I spoke to Victor Wooten, Howard Levy and Bela. They were all very gracious to us (and everyone else) while they tried to go about the business of getting to work. You tend to forget that these guys are working while we’re playing, and you also tend to forget how much traveling and waiting they have to do to get where they are going.
When we finally arrived in Telluride late yesterday afternoon, it was reunion time with our friends who introduced us to TBF years ago. One of the best things about the TBF experience is having a crew to share your tarp. We have one of the best.
I was up this morning before 6, out to stake out a second place in the line and to check on our young people who spent the night in line. 2 line spots for us this year because we’re putting up a Kelty in the back of the festival to act as a child shelter (our friends from Natchez have 2 youngsters with them). Here’s what the line looked like at 6:00 a.m. as I staked a claim on the second spot.
We’ll run the tarp at 10, then start a day of music. Tim O’Brien & Kevin Burke start the day, followed by The Head and The Heart, Cornmeal, Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper, Steve Earle & the Dukes & Duchesses, Sarah McLachlan and the Telluride House Band (Sam Bush, Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Edgar Meyer, Bryan Sutton & Stuart Duncan). Once we get inside, I’ll try to figure out what “press credentials” means in the context of Telluride, as I (along with Michael Bialas) will be blogging from here for No Depression.
Plan is to give updates the morning after on each day of the festival. We’ll see how that works in practice. I’ll do my best. Thanks so much to Kyla and Kim for the support in getting this all set up. No Depression rocks!
If you are interested in Tweets from Telluride, follow Mando Lines @mando_lines.