Winter blues help beat the winter blues
Blues society has 11 acts lined up for second annual music festival
Got those February blues?
If you can’t beat them, revel in the blues instead as the Edmonton Blues Society invites fans to the second annual Winter Blues Festival, grooving on through the deep freeze Saturday and Sunday.
Hosted by the St. Basil’s Cultural Centre, 11 of Edmonton’s and Alberta’s finest acts step up to perform their hottest tunes starting at mid-afternoon each day. Most bands get an hour-long set, with extended hits for the finale acts. This year patrons have the option of single-day passes or taking in the whole festival.
Expect to hear many shades of the genre, from funky rhythm ’n’ blues to rocking power chords, acoustic nods to the Delta blues, and a little New Orleans gumbo.
“People can come and go as they choose,” EBS president Doug Crighton notes, “but we’re hoping they will stay for the whole weekend. We just dipped our toes in the water last year but we want to continue to work with blues fests in Calgary and Saskatoon to try to expand our lineup.”
Libations, snacks and full meals will be available at this cash-only event.
For full background details on the artists check edmontonbluessociety.net.
Your Journal blues hound surveyed a few artists to find out what converted them to the blues. samantha King, singeR with Yeg tRio, winneR of the 2018 eBs memphis Bound Competition Fave blues album/concert: I was introduced to Stevie Ray Vaughan’s music at a friend’s house when I was 16 years old. After hearing Texas Flood I remember asking ‘Who is that?!’ I fell in love with the magic he created every time his fingers graced those silver strings and I wanted to follow in his footsteps. Fave performing experience: Working on a demo deal with RCA Nashville, recording three tracks produced by Raul Malo of The Mavericks, in the famous Ocean Way Studios right off Music Row. It used to be a church and they turned it into a huge studio where Ray Charles, Jimi Hendrix and Aretha Franklin recorded. The vibe was unforgettable but the best part was when I asked Raul to sing on one of the tracks I had written called Someday. He was so great, so humble and so giving.
Next project: I’m hoping to start recording before the summer. It’s been 16 years since I released an album. This time I want to write or co-write everything. I would love to get done before we hit up the Edmonton Blues Festival on Aug 25. dan sinasaC, veteRan KeYBoaRdist, pRoduCeR, Raised in windsoR, ont., hosts house ConCeRts at danLYn studio whiCh he Runs with his wife Connie. Fave blues album/concert: Seeing Johnny Winter live in Detroit at the age of 15 was very inspiring. The whole Detroit scene was so rich, like John Lee Hooker’s Motor City Is Burning.
Fave performing experience: I set up and helped engineer the last two Kenny (Blues Boss) Wayne CDs for Stony Plain, but really, we have had so many wonderful experiences between recording sessions and hosting 67 house concerts now in the studio and gigging. Our lives are very rich in music.
Next project: Presently working on my new project with Steve Hoy, Jack Semple, Bobby Cameron, Samantha King, etc., and working in the studio with famed producer/ engineer Miles Wilkinson for nearly two years now. I was just informed that my wife Connie and I are being inducted into the Edmonton Blues Hall of Fame for our support of music. peRCY maRshaLL, veteRan guitaRist, featuRed with the LYnne ChwYL Band Fave blues album/concert: I discovered blues through English rockers like Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page. I had been playing professionally since about age 13 but it wasn’t until the late ’70s that I really started to listen. Of all the LPs I rented from the public library it would be a tie between B.B. King’s Live at the Regal, and Magic Sam’s West Side Soul LP. B.B. King was at his peak on that record, from heart-melting slow licks on one track to smoking swing on the next.
Fave performing experience: My most cherished experience on stage was with The Nomads at the Winspear with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra backing us up in the early 2000s.
Next project: The Lynne Chwyl Blues Band is recording live off the floor at the Newcastle Pub the same weekend as Winter Blues Festival. tRoY tuRneR, veteRan guitaRist, singeR, Raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Based in edmonton Fave blues album/concert: When I was a kid, my grandmother who raised me used to put on gospel concerts and every holiday she would put on B.B. King, Live at Cook County Jail. I finally got to meet him when I was a teenager.
Fave performing experience: Meeting
up with Stevie Ray Vaughan when he was just busking in Austin, Texas (he borrowed my guitar to play the open stage at Antone’s), but my favourite studio experience might be my last (fourth) recording, Whole Lot of Blues (2011), which was recorded with Steve Cropper and Brian May of Queen and produced in Nashville.
Next project: My next album is recorded and it’s very political, about what’s going on in America right now. I’m not supposed to talk about it, and I don’t know how soon it will be out because it has to do with the label. tRaCY weLLs, Lead singeR, oveRdue BLues Band sinCe 2011 Fave blues album/concert: Hearing Susan Tedeschi sing It Hurt So Bad in 2008 made me realize a connection to the blues that I hadn’t clued into. It wasn’t until 2011 when I met our guitarist Dean Bruce that I realized I had to sing the blues.
Fave performing experience: Performing at the 2012 Calgary Blues Festival. I had done a vocal workshop and won an opening spot at the festival. The band and I needed to have CDs for the event so our first demo album Unleashed was recorded in a friend’s basement one weekend.
Next project: This summer Overdue will be developing and refining some original music that is already written.