Telluride Bluegrass Festival Blogging Contest
THIS CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED. Congratulations to our winners, James Reich and Steve Leftridge, who will each be blogging from Telluride ’09. Keep it here for their reports from the field.
Telluride Bluegrass Festival is a destination festival tucked away in the mountains of Colorado and run by Planet Bluegrass – who also happen to be the folks who bring us Rockygrass and Folks Fest each summer, along with a number of other events. This year Telluride will take place June 18-21. The line-up is pretty stellar, including Americana artists as versatile as David Byrne, Elvis Costello, Jenny Lewis, Punch Brothers, Todd Snider, Emmylou Harris, Three Girls & Their Buddy, and a number of others (keep reading or just scroll down for a full line-up).
In honor of Telluride’s 36th year, we’re holding a blogging contest for the entirety of April. At the end of the month, we will select two winners, each of whom will receive a press pass to the entire four-day event, including camping (valued at a total of roughly $285 per person), along with a second general admission ticket so you can bring a guest. Press access to Telluride means you’ll have access to a special press tent with wireless internet access and reserved seating in a press area directly in front of the stage. One of you – the Grand Prize Winner – will have special access to some of this year’s artists and will also get premium camping and a swag bag from the festival and No Depression.
Long story short, we’d like to send a couple of bloggers down to Telluride to report from the festival for the ND community site and we’re opening up the field. Here are the rules and details:
1. The subject of your blog must pertain to the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. This means profiling one of the artists on this year’s line-up (below), musing on the various genres represented on this year’s roster, a story about an experience you’ve had at Telluride or one of Planet Bluegrass’ other festivals in Lyons, Colo., or some other tangential topic of your choosing. If you can tie it back to Telluride, go for it.
2. You’re welcome to title your entry in whatever creative way you wish. However, please include the phrase “Telluride Contest” somewhere in there so that we know to consider it. You’re also welcome to enter more than once.
3. You must submit your entry as a blog post on the ND community site. Consult our FAQs if you’re unfamiliar with how to create a blog post on this site.
4. You must be able to attend the festival. This prize includes four days access to the festival and camping. You’ll be responsible for your transportation. If something comes up and you can’t make it, you’ll have to let us know so that we can choose someone else to go in your stead. Since we’re sending you there as a citizen blogger, we need you to actually be there reporting on the events of the week.
5. There’s no required minimum or maximum word count, but be realistic. A single paragraph (unless it’s the best paragraph ever) is probably not enough. 10,000 words might be a smidge too long.
6. Entries will be narrowed down by yours truly (ND Community Manager Kim Ruehl) and then a winner will be chosen by an elite panel of judges: Grant Alden, Peter Blackstock, and Brian Eyster from Planet Bluegrass.
And now for the full line-up:
David Byrne, Conor Oberst & the Mystic Valley Band, Three Girls & Their Buddy, Peter Rowan, Zac Brown Band, The Lovell Sisters, Jerry Douglas & Tim O’Brien, Railroad Earth, Elvis Costello & the Sugarcanes, Bela Fleck & Toumani Diabate, Jenny Lewis, John Cowan Band, The Greencards, Crooked Still, Blue Canyon Boys, Gaelic Storm, Sam Bush Band, Kasey Chambers &Shane Nicholson, Telluride Troubadour, Yonder Mountain String Band, Jerry Douglas Band, Punch Brothers Play & Sing Bluegrass, Greensky Bluegrass, Telluride House Band, Emmylou Harris, Tim O’Brien, Todd Snider, The Steeldrivers, Works Progress Administration, Mike Farris & the Roseland Rhythm Revue
So, take your time and get to blogging. May the best blogger win! (No, this is not an April Fools joke.)