About a month ago, I got a phone call from Felton Pruitt at Fat Music asking me to come out to the High Sierra Music Festival to co-anchor his radio webcast. He had set up the remote studio facility in a tent on the rise-up from the side of the main stage. This was a broad scope festival featuring a wide swath of the best and the brightest, like Warren Haynes, Neko Case, and Dawes. And there were some huge surprises, like Los Amigos Invisibles who do this really high energy Latin dance synth pop, and Ernest Ranglin, who is credited with being the Father of Ska. And then there were the new grass guys. While Felton and I were watching the Infamous Stringdusters and Yonder Mountain String Band, he commented that we are seeing the next generation of jam grass taking its place alongside established heroes like Sam Bush and Jerry Douglas.

That is high praise indeed from Felton, who was the first program director of the XM channel, Bluegrass Junction. As for me, I am intrigued with the repeated merging through the years of black and white music. The confluence over the last several centuries in this hemisphere has made for a very rich tapestry, a cross pollination that is still yielding potent results. The hallmarks of the blues are alive and well in this song from The Infamous Stringdusters, who came to our makeshift studio during last September's Americana Fest in Nashville. This week, they are touring out west, and will be playing the Grand Targhee Bluegrass Festival, which Felton is also webcasting next week.

With a tune from their album Things That Fly, here are Travis Book, Jeremy Garrett, Andy Hall, Andy Falco, Jesse Cobb, and Chris Pandolfi in all their glory, “All The Same.”

- Jessie Scott