By day he is a wealthy Wall Street Financier. By night, he dons a banjo and fancies himself a bluegrass fan. His name is Warren Hellman and he just put on one of the best three day concerts I've been to.
Susan and I flew out on Thursday to San Francisco. We stayed with our friends the Thompsons and we enjoyed the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in Golden Gate Park. There were 82 acts on six stages over three days. Let me see if I can list the acts we saw this weekend.
Emmylou Harris, Earl Scruggs, Jerry Jeff Walker, the Avett Brothers, Hot Tuna, the Indigo Girls, Jimmy Dale Gilmore, Elvis Costello, Nike Lowe, Sarah Lee & Johnny, Patty Smith, Robert Earl Keen and Hazel Dickens. Others there that we didn't get to see were T Bone Burnett, Randy Newman, Joan Baez, Blue Highway, Rozanne Cash, the Del McCoury Band and a bunch more.
Today's paper said there were 600,000 over the three days and there were 350,000 yesterday. I believe that. It was so packed yesterday there was no space on the lawn that wasn't a person. It was really amazing.
This three day festival was free for everyone except Warren Hellman. He paid the whole bill. It's the tenth year he has paid the full bill and this year he set up an endowment to ensure there will be at least 20 more to look forward to.
It was funny to me that most of the people attending this festival are left wing tree hugging greenies with no desire to associate with corporate big wigs.
A fun time was had by all. By the way, I'm certain I have a contact high from all the reefer that was circulating. I saw more spleefs than I have in 20 years and one was as big as a small torch.
How 'bout some pictures?!
Finally, here's a panoramic video of the Arrow Stage on Sunday when it was perhaps, the most packed in.
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