the USA t


his is one of my favourite places to perform,” says Veronica Swift, a 25-year-


old jazz singer from New York who’s spent the past year touring the world, as she gears up to go on stage. “I first performed here when


I was 10, and I came back nearly every year throughout my childhood,” she tells me. “It’s the scenery – the mountains, the sentimental value. It holds a special place.” I’m at Telluride Jazz


Festival, an intimate, three-day celebration of all things jazz that takes place in this tiny mountain resort every August, 2,600m high in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains. It’s certainly a memorable


setting. The stage sits in the middle of a bright green field, sandwiched between


travelweekly.co.uk


DESTINATIONS COLORADO | THE US


Thought Colorado was just about skiing? Laura French sees another side on a music-themed trip through this scenic mountain state


rainbow-coloured mountains swirled with green, purple, beige and copper. Aspen trees shoot up in tufts of yellow, lakes glow out like huge reflective pools, and clouds hang like puffs of cotton wool against a perfect blue sky. It’s movie-set material, and I’m soon dancing among the crowd – a mix of young, long- haired hippy types in tie-dye tops, and older cowboy-hatted locals picnicking on blankets – as the sky turns a deep, burning pink and the peaks glimmer a bright orange-gold beneath the setting sun. Welcome to Colorado; the


sprawling, active mountain state which, I soon discover, has a music scene to rival that of the Deep South, and plenty of extraordinary mountain backdrops to accompany it.


² 30 JANUARY 2020 73


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