Pebble Beach --

Woman in gallery: "Who's that?"

Another woman (checking pairings sheet): "T-Bone Burnett."

First woman: "Who's that?"

Exactly. And the least-famous famous player in this celebrity-studded tournament has no problem with his anonymity.

"I hate the whole notion of celebrity," T-Bone Burnett said Thursday night, sipping a martini in a bar at the Lodge after the first round of the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. "If somebody does something great, it should be pointed out and they should be respected for it, but the idea of being a celebrity - what is that about?"

He was asking the wrong guy. I couldn't even get the bartender's attention.

"Most people like things I've done," Burnett said, "but don't know that I did them. That's the good part. I'm not bothered by that. I like the Japanese idea of moving through the water and making no waves."

See how well T-Bone expresses himself? That talent for expression rises to genius when he is working with the geniuses of rock 'n' roll, producing their records, helping them shape their raw clay into beautiful works of art.

Who has worked with T-Bone? Yes. He has worked with the Who. Also (partial list): Elton John, Roy Orbison, Counting Crows, Tony Bennett, Steve Earle, Los Lobos, Elvis Costello, Justin Timberlake.

T-Bone posits that music is to America as wine is to France. It's our gift to the world, enriching humanity.

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If music is our wine, nobody has stomped and bottled the grapes quite like T-Bone Burnett has.

At 66, Burnett is a dinosaur. He broke into show biz in 1975, playing guitar in Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Review, studying rock under the master, riding the tour bus with Allen Ginsberg, Joni Mitchell, Sam Shepard.

Burnett the dinosaur is still roaring and raging. He is the Coen Brothers' go-to man for movie scores, from "The Big Lebowski" to current hit "Inside Llewyn Davis." He just wrapped up the massive task of weaving the music into the HBO eight-hour drama, "True Detective," with Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey.

Burnett finished that job Tuesday night in Los Angeles and flew here Wednesday morning. So his game might not be quite in tune, but he can play a bit.

Burnett grew up in Fort Worth, Texas. His mom was friends with Ben Hogan's wife, and when T-Bone and his pals hit balls on the driving range, they sometimes felt eyes on their backs.

"Hogan would come stand behind us and watch us," Burnett said. "It would just be incredibly daunting. And he wouldn't say anything, and then he would go back inside."

Burnett played a lot of golf, but mostly he played guitar, and chose not to follow his wealthy father's footsteps into big finance.

"When I was 20," T-Bone said, "I felt like if my choices are to be a hillbilly guitar player or to go to work for General Dynamics for 50 years and get a gold watch, I'll take my chances as a hillbilly guitar player. It seemed like it had more of a future."

Dad was fine with T-Bone's choice. Dad had been a great college tailback, and was courted by the Brooklyn Dodgers, but his father put the kibosh on the sports dream. So T-Bone's dad made lots of money, was unhappy and understood the concept of following your heart.

T-Bone followed his heart and made money. He retired from music in the mid-90s and did nothing but play golf for a few years. Got pretty good. Ran out of money. Poverty is vastly underrated as a creative force. T-Bone has done his best work since un-retiring.

Really, that was the game plan all along. When T-Bone was 10, his father asked him if he was going to be a writer.

Burnett: "I said, 'Yeah, I think I may.' He said, 'Well, then don't publish anything 'til you're 50.' I asked why. He said, 'You won't know what you're talking about until you're 50.' "

Dad was dead on. Post-50, T-Bone has been on fire, tackling projects of increasing complexity and challenge. He is working on a Southern Gothic supernatural musical with Stephen King and John Mellencamp. Burnett says of "True Detective," "It's way bigger than anything I've ever done. It's massive. It's a mountain like I've never climbed before."

And you talk about coming around full circle. Dylan recently came to T-Bone with 15 song lyrics Dylan wrote in 1967, stuffed into an envelope and forgot about.

Burnett said, "He just gave 'em to me and said, 'Finish 'em off.' "

That will cause an interviewer to do a spit-take with his Guinness.

T-Bone and five friends will create music for the lyrics and make a record. Burnett graduated from Dylan U decades ago, and that education is paying off.

"They're very good songs," Burnett says. "Isn't that beautiful? He's handing us these lyrics and we're getting to collaborate with a 27-year-old Bob Dylan. How great is that?"

On a scale of 1 to 10, I'll give it a million.

First, though, T-Bone has some golfing to do, out there in the shadows of the big celebs. Then it's back to work as an anonymous music superstar.

Stomp those grapes, brother.

For The Chronicle's coverage of Friday's second round, go to www.sfgate.com/sports.

Saturday TV

10 a.m. Golf Channel

Noon Channel: 5 Channel: 13 Channel: 46