Yoho & I followed the 2 concerts in Summit Co with 3 full 14 hr days of concerts at the 54th Telluride Bluegrass Festival in San Miguel Co. Wednesday was a travel day hauling the BC20X over a couple more mountain passes into our camping spot for the weekend, the Mary E Illum CG, on Natl Forest land. It was tight but I squeezed it into one of the few remaining spots at the CG, which is 7 miles from town. It was hardly the bucolic setting advertised. During normal operating conditions the campground hosts 20 sites... during the festival there were 800 people there ~ so cozy. On the way we stopped at Amica's in Salida.
Dining @ 221 S Oak ~ It ended up being a tasting ground as well as a listening ground for us. We decided to go upscale nightly for dinner... Telluride has some great choices and Yoho's eldest had visited a friend there on occasion and Jim wrangled recommendations. Rachel has connections and was trained for finery by J&M, so she steered us wisely. Jim was daily responsible for booking fine dining reservations for us ~ worked well. The arrival night we chose to skip FirstGrass up on the mountain in favor of going to 221 S Oak for a fine dinner and bottle of wine. We took the Crusher into town and were offered 3 hr free parking... which exceeded our hopes as we observed 3 miles of cars parked on either side of the road into town. Dinner and vino were excellent from Chef Eliza. Our experience was pretty wild too as 10 min after being seated, Tedeschi Trucks (Susan & Derek) sat down beside us! We'd see them tomorrow night as headliners.
Back at camp I needed to park the Crusher Too a mile up the road and walk back. We had nightcaps under the canopy while a team of kids played bocce with lighted balls.
Festavarian Scamper Logistics ~ We clothed in layers, coats on early (and likely late), and headed to the shuttle to town to queue for the "tarp run" entry to the grounds. We were not early at #607 in line but caught the view of Bridal Veil Falls from the queue. With just 2 of us we learned we could weedle into tiny spots. And nearby Festavarians, to which we were referred, were nice and accommodating. We had to go front-back vs side-side on Thu.
Day One @ TBF ~ As shown we anticipated a killer day 1 lineup and over 14 hrs of music. Woohoo. Chris kicked of the show with interpretations of Bach on the mandolin, and his original schtick-work. We visited with Brian & fam and dined during the Scottish Dallahan show but they were excellent from afar and at the chix sandwich spot. Sorry Wilke family; bad f-stop on the cam made you all fuzzy. Back to our listening spot we caught the emerging country start Noeline Hofmann ~ fun with good voice and band. Peter Rowan, of Grateful Dear and New Riders writing fame, played next ~ he's good, and old. The grounds have comprehensive port-a-potties, a merch tent, food vendors, an artist signing spot, and other vendors selling cool stuff. I found my mtn & fish vibe for the rest of the concert @ Loki.
AJ Lee & Blue Summit and Telluride House Band ~ Next up was one of my favorite bands currently: AJ Lee & Blue Summit. A strong member departed Blue Summit for the '26 year and season, Bakersfield's own XX. He and Sully Tuttle were kind of dups in the band anyway... both great guitarists with good singing voices for lead and vocals, and both songwriters of note. So, bummer, but I understand. AJ won the IMBA top vocalist last year! Their set was a hoot of a wide range across their 3 album catalog, including covers. Very good, always. I caught a vid of one of AJ's unreleased tunes but I can't recall the name. The Telluride House Band sounded great and was in '26 composed of a spectacular lineup: Jerry Douglas/dobro, Sam Bush/mandolin, Edgar Meyer/bass, Chris Eldridge (Critter)/guitar, and Stuart Duncan/fiddle. I was texting with my friend Pippus of Victoria and he mentioned many players were the same as when he came to To-Hell-You-Ride 36 yrs ago... and they are still great. Noeline was asked to join for a tune and the band got campy when Bella 'didn't have a 5 string capo' so Noam Pikelny (Pickles, a great banjo player) came out to be his capo for a song.
.JPG)
Watchhouse & Tedeschi Trucks ~ Closing day 1 were two great bands I also "came to see." Watchhouse played at twilight and crushed it. Emily & Andrew have a great way with words and playing ~ Andrew is often sad in songwriting but his poetry is epic. Emily is sweeter but the NCarolina duo joins each others stuff seamlessly. We've seen them before but this was a completely stellar show at a beautiful time-of-day in 'summer' in the San Juans. Tedeschi Trucks are an awesome 10 pc multi-genre band from FL. Mostly it's blues and soul but anything can happen with them. Susan & Derek are the bandleaders who each can hammer guitars and Susan's voice is killer. Plenty of stuff from their latest albums but also crowd pleaser Sly & The Family Stone covers of "everyday People." We noted the shift for the headliners... no sitting and it's time to bundle your tarp. Jim and I got back the shuttle exhausted but satisfied for sure. Returning across the festival grounds with tons of shit still in the way in the dark was harrowing but a lesson for Day 2.
What a day!
.JPG)
