High Country Snows

A couple of years after the pop hits stopped, Dan Fogelberg took this detour down the bluegrass/traditional acoustic music road. The result is a fine collection of mostly original songs, an album that holds up better than much of his earlier, better-known work. Accompanied by some of Nashville's top studio aces, Fogelberg sings of the California gold rush in the beautiful "Sutter's Mill," accompanies Doc Watson, Jerry Douglas and David Grisman on the instrumental bluegrass workout "Wolf Creek," and leads his all-star group speeding through several other bluegrass-flavored rave-ups. There's a touch of gospel here as well, with Vince Gill and Ricky Skaggs pitching in on vocal harmonies. By the time of this album's release in the mid-'80s, pop radio was no longer playing the music of mellow singer/songwriters like Fogelberg, but the lovely ballad "Go Down Easy" found some airplay on contemporary country stations. Although the set-closing "The Higher You Climb" is a too-long slow drag similar to some of the singer's earlier overblown productions, High Country Snows is a surprising musical high point for Dan Fogelberg.