53rd Annual Rocky Grass - 2025 - Preston Thompson Guitars

Rocky Grass hosted by Planet Bluegrass has always been a special one for me, as well as Thompson guitars. Rocky Grass, hosted in Lyons, Colorado, was one of the first bluegrass festivals I attended in my 20’s during the early 1990’s. I drove from Creede, Colorado, an artsy/theatre town where I lived at the time. Rocky Grass is also where I filmed some of my documentary about Peter Rowan called “The Tao of Bluegrass” interviewing Sally Truitt and a young Sarah Jarosz. Later in life, in a whole other chapter, it has been where Thompson guitars offers up a prize guitar for their Flatpick Guitar Competition. I have had the privilege and pleasure to run this company since 2019 after Preston left us and happy we have a relationship with Planet Bluegrass. They are extremely important to the bluegrass world sharing music with audiences for over 53 years!

There are always great players that are part of the Thompson family that play at Rocky Grass and this year was no exception with the likes of Liam Purcell, Lindsay Lou, Tom Knowlton from The Fretliners, Peter Rowan, Molly Tuttle, Seth Mulder, Travis Book from The Infamous Stringdusters and East Nash Grass guitarist James Kee (a new member of the Thompson family!)

This year’s RG flatpick guitar winner was G Rockwell – winning a Thompson D-MA with a special inlay of the Planet Bluegrass logo made with maple and walnut. Love that Liam Purcell gave the guitar away as a past winner from 2022. We are looking forward to following both of these talented young players careers for years to come!

Here is a short video filmed by Jenn de Groot – she captured a few moments with G Rockwell after his win. He is in several band mostly out of the east coast.. check them out – G ROCKWELL MUSIC, JACOBS LADDER MUSIC and HIGH HORSE BAND

And the 3rd place winners of the Rocky Grass Band Competition was The Sullivan Sisters. This band includes Soraya Sullivan with her new sunburst D-MA Thompson, we could not be more proud of the sister’s accomplishments along with the entire band. Check out their band on Instagram during the competition. The sisters grew up in North Carolina where they got their bluegrass chops and then relocated to the Chicago area. This band is going places fast and they recently became a band with Oscar Caudell, Finn McGuinness and Sammy Mougin adding their talented playing. If you are at IBMA they are honored to be selected as an Official Showcase Artist for the 2025 IBMA Bluegrass Ramble! Don’t miss them!