12:35 p.m. Saturday, Telluride, looks like it’s snowing on nearby peaks with Greensky (that’s pronounced Green Sky, not Green-ski) just finished and it’s pouring here.
The Top 10 Moments So Far at the 36th Telluride:
10. Mandolinist Chris Thile and his Punch Brothers band onstage right now delivering a set of classic bluegrass, a way of making up for last year’s depressing, minor key suite.
9. Shawn Colvin surprising the crowd with plaintative take on Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy.”
8. After a sterling set of rootsy twangy tunes Elvis Costello and the Sugarcanes encored with George Jones’ “The Race is On” and Mr. Costello’s “What’s So Funny (About Peace, Love and Understanding).”
7. Fireworks during the Railroad Earth set, a welcome relief from the drought and forest fire years.
6. John Cowan’s tribute to ole English balladry: the Moody Blues’ “Tuesday Afternoon” into Led Zeppelin’s “Goin’ to California.”
5. Emmylou Harris applying her patented aching soprano to the classic “Love Hurts.”
4. Peter Rowan reinventing his Old and In The Way hit “Panama Red” with a Latin American accent.
3. The interwoven sibling harmonies of the three Lovell Sisters.
2. A transcendental “Dueling Banjos” with banjo savant Bela Fleck and West Africa’s most celebrated instrumentalist, the brilliant Toumani Diabete.
1. David Byrne’s entire kinetic set was one of the best I’ve ever seen at Telluride. Too cool for words.