This past weekend the Yonder Mountain String Band welcomed a number of artists and
festivalgoers to Horning’s Hideout for its sixth annual Northwest String Summit.
As with the past few years, Yonder expanded to a quintet over the three days in
North Plains, Oregon with Darol Anger joining the group on fiddle.
Throughout the Summit, during its set, Yonder also brought out some of the day’s preceding
performers. On Friday the 24th, two members of the New
Riders of the Purple Sage stepped up, with David Nelson first emerging for Catch
A Criminal on guitar and vocals, with Buddy Cage adding on pedal steel to Queen
Of The Earth and Angel. Nelson then returned along with Cage for Dim Lights Thick Smoke.
Saturdays show featured extended appearances by two performers there with their
current groups: Tony Trischka and Drew Emmitt. Trischka appeared for three songs
during the first set and Brittany Haas, who is currently touring with him, also added fiddle
to Death Trip. A bit later the second set opened up with Drew Emmitt on mandolin
for No Expectations. Emmitt remained for the next few tunes and later returned
during the encore with bandmate Noam Pikelny for Used To Call Me Baby. Uncle Earls KC Groves appeared a bit earlier in the set on vocals and guitar during Columbus.
Both Trischka and Emmitt came back on Sunday for Yonder’s final set of the festival.
Prior to then, however, the group brought out longtime associate Benny Galloway,
who had performed a late night set the previous evening with the Wayword Sons, for
‘How Far I’d Fall’ and ‘Daddy Used To Do It.’ Then during the second set, many of the musicians who had performed during the Jam that had preceded Yonder’s appearance, emerged. Trischka, Emmitt, Haas, Tyler Grant, Steven Sandifer and Anders Beck were among the artists who joined in for the segued
sequence that opened the second set, from ‘My Gal’ into ‘Girlfriend Is Better’ into ‘Good Hearted Woman.’ These players then returned for the festival-closing
take on John Hartford’s ‘Steam Powered Aeroplane.’