…but then the silver-haired queen of country took the stage and began to introduce her fellow musicians…

“Buddy Miller, the Milk Carton duo, and my captain, Mr. Steve Earle.”

After quickly explaining the ‘in the round’ format, Steve Earle started the circle of songs. “We are here for a cause and we’ll get to that, but you are here to be entertained, so I’m just gonna play the blues.” And with that, from the comfort of his stool center stage, Mr. Earle opened the night with “You’re the Best Lover That I Ever Had”. Emmylou was up next with “Boulder to Birmingham”, and although she probably had the most muted personality of the entire crew, her voice soared like an angel during the song that was so appropriate for the night. Buddy Miller followed with a personality that more than made up for the reserved Emmylou. The man had tales to tell. He went on and on about playing Boulder on New Year’s Eve 2000 (“when we were all afraid of Y2K“), his wife’s obsession with salad dressing and European meat, and trying to get landmines banned. Miller literally threatened to use his time telling stories instead of singing songs, but he was finally convinced to pick up his guitar and take us through Dolly & Porter’s “Burning the Midnight Oil”.

The Milk Carton Kids were situated by themselves stage left and they acted as a sort of comic relief for the evening. Before singing their first harmony “about death,” they spoke about how they ended up on the tour. “Our manager called us up and said ‘Emmylou would like to know…’ and we said ‘yup!’” They didn’t know what Emmylou wanted of them, but it was Emmylou, so they were down for whatever. “Just don’t ask us to do anything weird, ok?” She laughed and replied “you can always say no, if you dare.” Then their attention turned to Mr. Miller, “we remember Y2K as well; it was the strangest day of high school.” All comedy aside, The Milk Carton Kids are a Grammy-nominated/AMA-winning folk duo who had earned the right to share the stage with those who had influenced them.

The rest of the two-hour performance kept the rotation going with a nice balance of humor, music, and messaging around the cause at hand. Earle joked about growing up in occupied Mexico (San Antonio) before rattling off shocking statistics as an intro to Woody Guthrie’s “Deportee”. Emmylou told stories about her longtime friend and peer Dolly Parton (having just seen Dolly this summer, it’s crazy how different the two of them are), before performing “To Daddy”. Miller’s “Wide River to Cross” was almost a duet between him and Harris; opening up more and more collaboration as the night progressed.

see more at http://ilistensoyoudonthaveto.com/2016/10/15/lampedusa-concert-for-refugees-boulder-theater-10-06-16/

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