Michael Hughes

A fixture on Colorado’s Celtic music scene is marking a milestone. Avourneen was founded a decade ago, by singer-songwriter Adam Goldstein, along with fiddle player Cieran Morden.

“On Record” documents decades of popular music. The book series comes from G. Brown, longtime contributor to the Denver Post and head of the Colorado Music Experience. He uses thousands of photographs and draws from countless interviews to share his encounters with Rock ‘n’ Roll royalty. The latest volumes are out: “1979” and “1986.”

Bay Bryan grew up in Golden, Colorado but has called Manchester, England home since 2017.

Few Colorado musicians have had a more impressive and varied career than Chris Daniels. The singer-songwriter has led Chris Daniels and The Kings for 40 years.

Curtiss O’Rorke Stedman, aka Cousin Curtiss, has moved from Placerville to Montrose, where he’s recorded his latest album.  It delivers his signature “roots-stomp” sound — think “the blues at bluegrass speeds.” Curtiss shared his favorite track with us, a fiery ode to life on the road, titled “Furnace.”

In Fruita, there’s a renovated storefront called the Cavalcade, a nonprofit arts venue featuring open night mic on Thursdays. Greg Luck runs the popular event, and performs in it too, as “The Uncomfortable Plateau.” He shares how he came up with that name, and his song, “Looking Back.”

Chris Pandolfi, of Denver, plays banjo for The Infamous Stringdusters. They perform at Red Rocks September 6, supporting country star Dierks Bentley.

Red Rocks was recently named the most attended music venue in the world. G. Brown, executive director of the Colorado Music Experience, wrote a history of the amphitheater, and he’s just updated it with more stories and photographs to delight fans. The book’s called, “Red Rocks: The Concert Years.”

We remember a Colorado music pioneer who transported audiences to another time and place. Max Morath was a pianist, composer, TV personality and author with a deep love of American popular music, especially ragtime.

The 50th Annual Telluride Bluegrass Festival starts Thursday. Every June, thousands of “festivarians,” as they’re known, descend on the small mountain town for 4 days of music.

Travis McNamara is best known as the banjo player in the band Trout Steak Revival. But the pandemic pushed him into an experimental space — anything but bluegrass. The result of virtual connections he made with other Colorado artists is “Moon Calendar,” an album that’s both highly listenable and full of surprises.

ule recently had something of a musical homecoming. The Denver-born, LA-based singer-songwriter made her first big splash with audiences in 1995 with the queer-themed single “I Kissed a Girl.” The last weekend of February, Sobule returned to Denver for a pair of sold-out shows that made her feel right at home, literally! She performed in the house she grew up in. And It all started with a visit to the old Hilltop neighborhood.

Crêpe Girl is the indie music project of 21-year-old Eliza Grégoire, of Grand Junction. She’s a first-generation American, born to French parents.

Jazz artist and Denver native Dianne Reeves didn’t attend last week’s Emmys, but her work was very much present when actress Sheryl Lee Ralph gave new life to her song, “Endangered Species” in Ralph’s acceptance speech.