The very first inductee in the Hall of Fame was the late John Denver, who would have turned seventy on New Year's Eve. And Hickenlooper displayed his own hankering for country roads on New Year's Day, when he was at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville: His appearance backstage was touted on the Opry's January 2 radio broadcast. It's "safe to say the governor is a man of many musical tastes," says his spokeswoman. Still, she notes, "any band from Colorado will always be preferred." See also: Ten People Who Belong in the Colorado Music Hall of Fame
Hickenlooper will prove that at his inauguration party on Tuesday, January 13, which includes a sold-out concert at the Ogden Theatre featuring locals Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats, Big Head Todd and the Monsters, the String Cheese Incident and the Lumineers.A dinner beforehand is likely to feature craft beer; after all, Hickenlooper gained his earliest local fame as the co-founder of the Wynkoop Brewing Company, which he no longer owns. But unlike at his inauguration four years ago, Hick won't arrive on the back of a keg-loaded carriage, and he won't be drinking Inaugurale, a beer that the Wynkoop brewed especially for that day. Lee Driscoll, who runs the Breckenridge-Wynkoop holding company, says the brewery wasn't able to make it this year.
But Wynkoop has packaged in cans for the first time the imperial brown that Inaugurale was based on: Artillery Winter Ale, which used to be called Capt. Hickenlooper's Flying Artillery Ale, after the future governor's great-great grandfather, who fought in the Civil War.
Although the concert is sold out, tickets to the reception/dinner that starts at 5 p.m. January 13 at the Fillmore may still be available; find out here.
