The weather was great, the entertainment was awesome, and Targhee Fest 2015 will certainly be remembered as another terrific music festival in the Tetons.

We headed out for the festival on Thursday with the intention of taking in The Young Dubliners at an outdoor show that evening in Victor, Idaho, just down the road from the festival venue at Grand Targhee Resort, but, not wanting to set up camp in the dark, we missed out on what we later heard was a great performance. We made up for it with a great night under the stars in the high mountain meadow that was to be our home for the next few days.

Not an act was missed as the festival kicked off on Friday. Jeff Crosby and the Refugees took the Targhee stage first with a very impressive opening act, followed by singer-songwriter Martin Sexton, who delighted the ever-growing crowd on the venue with his melodious storytelling. The Targhee Fest crowd was next treated to a rare solo performance by rock/blues legend Warren Haynes, a founding member of Gov’t Mule, who ended the night’s entertainment in fine form.

Saturday dawned with a promise of another gorgeous day in the Tetons, but as we took our time getting ready for another day of live music, a bit of rain began to move in, just as the weatherman had forecast. We missed Martha Scanlan and Amy Helm and the Handsome Strangers as a result of our dawdling, but, because of the location of our camp, we could certainly hear their performances. We made it onto the venue just as Patti Griffin took the stage and took the crowd into her hand. We remained there for Mavis Staples, who played through a bit of rain and small hail without skipping a beat, much to the crowd’s delight--no one left the venue during Staples’ act, whether they had on rain gear or not. We rode out the weather back in camp during Jackie Greene’s performance, but again, we could hear his performance with a certain bit of longing, for he certainly rocked the crowd. We made it back up to the venue for Bruce Hornsby and the Noisemakers, who closed out the evening with another fine performance, putting a nice Americana twist on a few of Hornsby’s “greatest hits,” such as “The Way It Is,” and offering up some fine new songs as well.

Sunday’s entertainment began with Good Old War, an Indie band whose handle derives from the last names of the band’s three founding members, and who woke the slumbering Sunday audience from their daydreams in a good way. James McMurtry took the stage next, offering up a class act as the cloudless day began to turn warmer. The Wood Brothers kept things hot for the Sunday crowd, and Brandi Carlile put the finishing touches on the festival with a long and lively performance.

Though the festival proper wrapped up around 7:00 on Sunday evening, we continued an evening of music at Grand Targhee Resort’s Trap Bar courtesy of Targhee Fest’s longtime producer, Tom Garnsey, whose band the Hooligans packed the Trap on Sunday night. One shining star during the Hooligans performance was Garnsey’s son Ryan, whose skill on the keyboards brought about several positive comments from onlookers used to seeing rock legend Bill Payne of Little Feat at the keyboards when the Hooligans perform. We headed back to camp as the call went out for the last bus back to Driggs for festival diehards. The next morning, we packed up camp and headed back to Bozeman, with our appetite for live music temporarily whetted, and already planning for Targhee Fest next year.