‘In The Pines’ reinvention natural for Peter Rowan

3:25 P.M. June 21, Telluride CO – While waiting for the latest incarnation of Peter Rowan to take the stage, I’m looking at my festival “program” from  the 4th Annual Telluride Bluegrass and Country Music Festival in 1977. It was a single sheet printed on both sides in black and white. Friday was the opening day featuring Dan Sadowsky and Chaz Leary, Buffalo Brothers, Possum, Tim Goodman Band and Navarro. Saturday’s lineup boasted Peter Rowan, Bryan Bowers, New Grass Revival and John Hartford. On Sunday many of the bands did a second set plus Mason Williams and Byron Berline. It’s 2013 and Rowan heads a country-style band with drummer, piano and electric guitar, a nice follow-up to the stellar country rock of Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell on Thursday. Twang hangs like mist upon the San Juan peaks … or it could just be really dusty after a windy day in Telluride. Two festival pioneers and genre-benders, Sam Bush and Peter Rowan, are singing the bluegrass standard “In The Pines.” Their respect for the genre is so clear that even Bill Monroe, bless his soul, could not object to tasteful, spacey bluegrass electric guitar. Telluride, after all, is the practical birthplace of jamgrass from New Grass Revival to Leftover Salmon to String Cheese Incident to Yonder Mountain String Band and beyond.

Next up: The Punch Brothers 5:30 p.m. and String Cheese Incident 7:15 p.m. steaming live at KOTO.org.