Rosanne Cash "I'm Movin' On"

Glory be, we are in return mode from Steamboat Springs, snow-blind from the fun of it all. Whew! We always feel like we are coming home when we get there each year, and leaving is always bittersweet. In the next days, weeks, and months, we will be rolling out more MusicFest at Steamboat videos. We can't wait to share them all with you, but first we need to trek across the country again to our respective homes. So this is the champagne sorbet course in between realities, that of event and home.

"I'm Movin' On." The title works, though we don't mean to imply any of the inherent negative message of the song. Rosanne Cash takes the Hank Snow tune and makes it her own with a sultry and restrained delivery. Her album The List, the important songs her father, Johnny Cash, wanted to educate her to, wound up at #2 on the Americana Music Association's Top 100 of 2010. It's also been nominated for a 2011 GRAMMY® award in the Best Americana Album category. And The List already won Album of the Year this past September at The Americana Honors & Awards show, held at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville during AmericanaFest. By the way, dates have been announced for this year's event from October 12 through 15 in Nashville. But I am getting ahead of myself. We have miles to go before we sleep. "I'm Movin' On."

- Jessie Scott

Hayes Carll "Another Like You"

And...scene. MusicFest at Steamboat Springs is done for another year, and what an amazing time it was. We kiss the mountains and big blue Rocky Mountain sky goodbye, as we try to catch our altitude compromised breath, and center our alcohol infused brains. Good times. It is interesting to me that this music scene, Texas, Red Dirt, and Americana, has expanded so much that it can no longer be contained at one event. What I mean is there are SO many performers now that you can't stage them all in one place. Could take weeks, if you did that actually! It is just exploding.

There were some artists on the MusicFest roster last year that didn't make it this time. Like Hayes Carll, for instance. But never fear, we caught up with him in September during Americana Fest in Nashville, and voila! We have new music for you. Hayes' new CD KMAG YOYO (& other American stories) hits the street on February 15th. There are several ways to pre-order, see each of the bundles and other exclusives at the official Hayes Carll store. If you are lucky enough to have a local radio station that plays Americana you might be hearing music from his new CD any minute. We have an incredible duet for you today at Music Fog, and you'll find the studio version on the new album next month. Here's Hayes and bassist Bonnie Whitmore trading lines on this modern day love song which features one character that watches Fox News, and the other who enjoys MSNBC...as Hayes puts it!

- Jessie Scott

The MusicFest 2011 - Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow

View from our studio at the Steamboat Grand HotelThe 2011 MusicFest at Steamboat is getting to be a rear view mirror memory, as we savor the sweetness of the snow, the serenity of Steamboat and the magic of the music, with everyone just having the best of all possible times. We are breaking down the set and packing up our equipment. We filmed 27 artists in all on this trip, and we offer huge hugs and kisses to the Steamboat Grand staff, the Steamboat Resort people, all the managers, crew and artists.

We can't tell you how much this means to us to share in the community that John and Robin and the rest of the Dickson Productions folks have created. We are eternally grateful for the opportunity to advance our mission. Music Fog was formed just before the MusicFest 2009, when Beans, Aaron, Ben, Chris, and I lost our jobs due the merger of XM and Sirius satellite radio. We took our severance money and invested in ourselves, and in the concept of being able to go direct to you on the web with no gatekeepers. The goal was twofold: to continue to showcase the kind of music I was programming on my channel, X Country on XM, as well as to showcase the production skills of Aaron and Beans. For two years we have criss crossed the country attending events where many musicians congregate. We set an impossibly packed schedule for ourselves on site. We are lucky if we sleep for four hours a night, but as archivists, we know we are capturing these once in a lifetime moments in the same way that John and Alan Lomax captured their era. Only we are including the pictures. We are a for hire production company, and we love getting out on the road and proving we can make it look good and sound good, with a little ingenuity, wherever we set up our studio. So we thank YOU for watching our videos, reading our articles, and sharing us with your friends that love this real deal music too. The faster we grow, the better we serve to be a megaphone for the music which deserves to find a larger audience. Because it is just that good.

Whenever we have a kitchen on premises, we feed the artists that come in to play for us. This year, I made Green Chile Stew, Beans did eight pounds of Mystery Brisket, Aaron cooked Pork Chile Verde, and Denise did a Beef Bourguignon. Sheila hit the slopes between takes, and we all ate and drank. As Paul Thorn said on his EPK, "How do we travel? We travel WELL!" Speaking of Paul Thorn, that is our next trip! We will be heading down to Muscle Shoals to produce his live webcast on Saturday January 29th!

So long from Steamboat...'till next year!

- Jessie Scott