Fiddle star Michael Cleveland plays Telluride Bluegrass

10 Jun Fiddle star Michael Cleveland plays Telluride Bluegrass

[click "Play", Michael Cleveland speaks with Susan, but notes the date of his performance is the 16th, not the 17th)

There is a nice, alliterative quality to "fire" and "fiddle," two words that become one great big idea in the skilled hands of Michael Cleveland. Move over Nero. When Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper play the 38th annual Telluride Bluegrass Festival Thursday, June 16, guaranteed Telluride Town Park burns.

The blind Henryville, Indiana native quickly became renowned as one of the hottest attractions in bluegrass for his blistering and unconventional fiddle style. By his early teens, Michael Cleveland had appeared on the Grand Ole Opry (as a guest ofTelluride Bluegrass regular Allison Krauss), A Prairie Home Companion, and before the United States Congress.

After graduation from the Kentucky School for the Blind, Michael performed with various musicians, among them, Dale Ann Bradley and Rhonda Vincent. His work on the Rounder album "Back Home Again" earned him his first prestigious International Bluegrass Music Association's Instrumental Performer of the Year in the fiddle category. He has won that title eight times.

To learn more, click the "play" button and listen to Michael Cleveland's interview.

Photo credit: McGuire