Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2026

5 hours ago

7 min read

Warren Hellmans gift to all the music lovers in the Bay and beyond!

October 2-4 was a gorgeous weekend of music for about 800,00 attendees, over the three days, in sunny San Francisco! Mellow and super friendly are usually my descriptives of the annual Hardly Strictly Bluegrass music festival. This year was no exception!

As soon as I entered the park I heard the voice of my friend Chuck Poling through the speakers at the Towers of Gold stage. If you are unfamiliar with Chuck, he has been the emcee of the Rooster stage for the last 25 years. For those of you who know Chuck, may know that this year is a very different HSB for him, as his beloved wife of 44 years, Jeanie Poling passed away at the end of August. Jeanie is very missed by many people in music, and in the bluegrass arena. This is dedicated to my friend Jeanie Poling with love. Although Jeanie was not at HSB 2026 in body...for me, her presence in the park was felt everywhere, during all three days.❤️

HSB is so varied and there are so many bands and artists, I'm not going into much detail about many of the sets as I checked out a lot of them, some briefly, some, I stayed for the full set. As I said, I began my weekend at the Towers of Gold stage. The band Chuck introduced was, honoring the late Todd Snider with several of his friends including, Aaron Lee Tasjan, and his band the Burnouts. And a bunch of special guests including, John Craigie, Elizabeth Cook, and Steve Poltz.

Aaron Lee Tasjan - Todd Snider Rules set

After the set, I then made my way to the Arrow stage where the wonderful Wreckless Strangers were performing. Always a great band, with the lovely Amber Morris and David Noble fronting the band and Mick Hellman on drums. With Josh Zucker on bass, Rob Anderson on guitar and Fletcher Nielsen on keys. Wreckless Strangers is a great mix of soul, R&B, rock and funk....and they just released some great new material, Dirty Souls. I highly suggest checking out their music!

Later on Day 1 was the Molly Tuttle set. I had an appointment to meet with her before she went onstage. We had a brief photo shoot and chat and then she went onstage. She was lovely and welcoming, especially considering that we were meeting up right before her set.

Tuttle had a huge audience on this first day of the festival. She grew up attending HSBs with her dad over the years. And a few songs into her set, Jack Tuttle, her dad, entered the stage and performed with her. He has been her musical influence since she's a small child. For those who don't know, Molly has alopecia and is, and always has been bald. She used to be embarrassed, but now she is an absolute inspiration to others with alopecia. Only a month ago, she was married to Ketch, from Old Crow Medicine Show who also played this weekend.

I was looking forward to meeting and photographing Molly. She is usually wearing a wig, but sometimes removes it onstage. Backstage when we met and I shot some photos of her she was ready for the stage and was indeed wearing a wig. She is captivating and talented. I can see a long fruitful career for this beautiful vibrant talented young woman. The artist I always love seeing at HSB or anywhere is Robert Plant. Last time he played HSB was in 2019 - AMAZING as usual. This HSB, he was headlining on Sunday with his band Saving Grace with Suzi Dian. So I didn't expect to see him before then. But there are always nice surprises at every festival and Robert Plants' appearance with Buddy Miller on Saturday (the day before his own set) was a brilliant surprise for me and who ever was lucky enough to be present at the Rooster Stage.

Robert Plant playing on Saturday (during Buddy Millers set).

Every year the HSB schedule has me doing research into the artists as I am familiar with so few. This year was the same. But even though I am unfamiliar with most of the names, I always leave my HSB experience with a new favorite! This year my new fave was Jess Welles.

And during the weekend, the other bonus is that I meet loads of new people. Everyone is kind and friendly. I'm always wearing The Music Soup tee shirt so people stop me and let me know they're readers of this publication. And they are so nice. So, a big thank you to all of you that stopped me and said hello! I appreciate you.

Old Crow Medicine Show with special guests, David Rawlings and Gillian Welch

HSB is a music festival with five stages. Some of the artists I did manage to see all or part of their sets were, Wreckless Strangers, Molly Tuttle, Lukas Nelson, Old Crow Medicine Show, Robert Plant, Buddy Miller, Jesse Welles, Todd Snider Rules, Marco and the Polos, Marty Stuart, John Craigie with the Coffis Bros...and more. Apart from my absolute fave, Robert Plant x2...I always love when I come away with a new favorite artist that I discovered at this festival...and this year it was Jesse Welles. Oh my! His set took my breath away...in my opinion he was absolutely excellent. And the huge adoring crowd that piled in at his stage was proof of his popularity. His lyrics are abundant and plentiful, descriptive, timely and intelligent and so fitting for today. Megan, my friend who I was with during his set is a very prolific and talented singer songwriter herself and she said to me during the Jesse Welles set that she wished there was a screen showing the lyrics he was singing. I was thinking the same thing! His lyrics were very filling, like a huge satisfying meal! It seems to me, that he may be the next big thing in the singer songwriter world.

I adore Molly Tuttle, and I think she has become the new darling of the HSB weekend. However, when Robert Plant took the stage right in front of me, unexpectedly during the Buddy Miller set on Saturday...internally, the 14 year old inside me woke up! Internally I was 14 again...and you know what...that's one of the special joys of music...we get to revisit our youth with a familiar artist from our childhood. That surprise set when Plant joined Miller onstage was spectacular (for me). Plant played harmonica for a couple of the songs he played with Miller. And at one point he needed lyrics. So they brought him out scrolls of paper with huge letters with the lyrics. He shared and laughed with the audience that he can't see, and the pages were nessesary!

Robert Plant appeared after Buddy Millers songs with Emmylou Harris on Day 2. Harris was another surprise guest that joined Buddy Miller. It's always nice to see Emmylou play. She seems to play most HSBs. I think she may be the original 'darling' of the festival!

On Saturday after Robert Plants songs with Buddy Miller, I had a nice chat backstage with Woz, Steve Wozniak and his lovely wife Janet. We chatted about randon things from politics to Apple. Then whilst shooting a couple pics of them, Woz pulls out silly fake teeth from his pocket and slides them into his mouth! He seems like a real pranster! Very easy to talk to. He gave me his biz card, which doubles as a knife to cut steak with, he told me. I've been in touch, and hope to eventually interview him. What a fascinating, and fun guy, and a super easy chat!

Janet and Steve Wozniak (with the silly teeth he pulled out of his pocket!)

My last set of the weekend on Sunday, was the man himself, Robert Plant and his band, Saving Grace with Suzi Dian. Before his set, the photographers were notified there would be no photo pit access. So I made my way to the front of the crowd. I met two lovely people at the front rail. They welcomed me to stand with them and get my shots. I appreciate people like them at a show. Photographing from the crowd, loaded up with camera gear is usually very challenging for me. But with generous, kind people like Julie and Greg, it does help. A big thank you goes out to them to help me get these captures during that set!

If you have never been to a Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Music Festival, they usually fall in the first weekend of October, they are always free, (thanks to Warren Hellman) and they're always filled with great music and super nice people! A big thank you to the Warren Hellman Foundation for this amazing gift to all the music lovers of San Francisco. As always....Life is short and gets shorter everyday. Live life NOW. Please, be kind to each other. Greet each day with love in your heart. Never regret anything that made you smile. Make amends to those we may have hurt along the way. Take accountability and apologize - we are human and everyone makes mistakes! Life is precious. Remember that it can end at any moment. Keep learning, growing, healing and improve yourself daily. Protect our democracy. Use your voice and PLEASE VOTE! Your vote does count! And we must all take care of our planet. 🌍 Turn up the music and see art! With love and gratitude,

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