Well, by now most of you have heard, Bob has joined an alliance of Valley venues that will require all patrons to their particular club, concert hall or theater starting Sept. 20 to have proof of vaccination or a negative Covid-19 test 24 hours before their event. These owners did this in the name of public health and safety. 99% of the current surge in cases have affected unvaccinated people and still there is pushback. It ain't no joke. You read about anti-vaxers dying every day from this stuff. Please don't let this decision cloud your judgment or turn you away from live music. We did without for a year and a half. Let's not go back in the house to stay again. My two cents. Mr. King's birthday was yesterday. He would have been 96. There is no question as to his influence on the music. He played them Blues for 70+ years. It's unusual to have temps in two digits in August, but we'll take it. Plenty cool enough for you to get out and enjoy your favorite act as more and more of them are gigging again. Get your shot and you can dance and hug all you want. Have a good week. Sincerely, Jim Crawford - PBS |
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Blues To Use The Sugar Thieves Gary Zak & The Outbacks Hans Olson Rocket 88s JC& The Rockers Carvin Jones Hoodoo Casters Rhythm Room Nina Curri Paris James Mother Road Trio Blues Review Band Reverbnationbluesmanmike Mike Eldred Facebook Big Daddy D & The Dynamites Facebook www.bigdadddyd.com Cadillac Assembly Line Facebook Innocent Joe and the Hostile Witnesses Facebook Chuck Hall Facebook Pop Top Facebook Tommy Grills Band Facebook Sweet Baby Ray SweetBabyRaysBlues.com Thermal Blues Express Thermal Blues Express.com Tuesday, August 17 Carvin Jones, 8 p.m., Klein Center for the Performing Arts, Sierra Vista Gypsy & Hooter’s Blues JAM, 6 p.m., Pho Cao, Scottsdale Wednesday, August 18 Tool Shed JAM, 7 p.m, Blooze Bar, Phoenix Johnny Miller JAM, 7 p.m., Coop’s, Glendale Thursday, August 19 Mike Eldred Trio, 8 p.m., Kazimierz, Scottsdale Hans Olson, 6 p.m., Handlebar, Apache Junction Friday, August 20 Cold Shott & The Hurricane Horns, 8 p.m., Westside Blues & Jazz, Glendale Big Pete Pearson, 7:30 p.m., Chandler Center for the Arts, Chandler Blues Review Band, 7 p.m., Jersey D’s, Chandler Saturday, August 21 Big Pete Pearson, 8 p.m., Westside Blues & Jazz, Glendale
Mike Eldred Trio, 6 p.m., Kazimierz, Scottsdale Rocket 88s, 8 p.m., American Italian Club, Phoenix Innocent Joe & The Hostile Witnesses, 7 p.m., Rags, Youngtown BluZone Duo, 6 p.m., Voodoo Daddy’s, Tempe Leon J, 12:30 p.m., Javelina Leap Winery, Cornville
Sunday, August 22 Big Daddy D & The Dynamites, 2 p.m., 10/12 Lounge, Clarkdale
Leon J, 12:30 p.m., Javelina Leap Winery, Cornville Monday, August 23 Hooter’s Monday Night Blues JAM, 7 p.m., Starlite, Glendale |
| Mr. King
By Terry Gross, NPR
Born Riley B. King in Indianola, Miss., in 1925, King began his life on a plantation, where he was born the son of a sharecropper. Speaking to Fresh Air's Terry Gross in 1996, King remembered an early life without telephones, electricity or any outside opportunities. "A lot of the people, including myself in the early years, just thought this was it, you raise your families and you get old, you die, your families take over, kids, what have you," King said. But the world would soon open to the musician. In 1947, he moved to Memphis and began busking on streets with his guitar. Two years later, King made his first recording, and he's been playing the blues, touring and recording ever since. No matter how many times he performed, King admitted to feeling a rush of nerves whenever he stepped on stage. "I developed in my head that I'm never any better than my last concert or the last time I played, so it's like an audition each time," he said. "You get nervous just before going onstage. I still have that, but I think it's more like concern. You're concerned about the people — like meeting your in-laws for the first time." On growing up on a plantation in Mississippi Believe it or not, the people [who] lived on the plantation felt like that this was really home, most of them, and we were being taken care [of] because the boss of the plantation usually was like your lawyer, your judge, your father, your mom. He was your — practically everything. People lived on plantations felt, believe it or not, secure to be there. If they needed a few bucks, usually they could get this from the boss man, and it's taken out at the end of the year... I somehow later started to feel that there was more for me and a few others. I think the same way with young people today; they feel that they're not really happy with the status quo. On moving to Memphis It was like, let's say you leave Cairo, Ill., and you moved to Chicago. Wow! That's what Memphis was like: Wow, great big city. I had never been in a city that large before. ... I felt that it was a place of learning, because I was lucky my cousin Bukka White lived there and I had a chance to meet a lot of people when I came to Memphis. And I would go down on Beale Street and hear all these fine musicians playing, especially on the weekends. Memphis was sort of like Chicago or any of the major metropolitan areas. People was coming through going east or west; in other words, it was sort of like a meeting place, if you will — a port for people traveling from different places. So I had a chance to meet a lot of great giants in the business, jazz and otherwise. On how his 1952 hit "3 O'Clock Blues" changed his life Well, it changed my life in many ways. One thing, financially, because I had been making about $60 a week at this radio station, and I would go out and pick cotton. I would drive trucks and tractors; I did everything to try to make ends meet, if you will, because my music wasn't taking care of me. When I made "3 O'Clock Blues," I started then to get guarantees, maybe like [$400] or $500 a day when I played out, and that made a big difference ... financially speaking, because then I could hire more people to work with me. Made life easier. I could get a driver to keep from having to drive to all the different places by myself, and my wife and I was able to live better, able to pay the band better. I was able to do many things that I hadn't been able to do prior to that. And, of course, [I] was much more popular, if you will. I just started to feel then that I was a real entertainer. On not crossing over in the same way Ray Charles and Chuck Berry did In the beginning, I was really confused about the way the politics ran in music. I always thought if you made a good record, it was a good record. ... Not black, not white, not red or yellow — but people would like it. Some people would like it. But I learned quickly after I got into the music business that there are so many categories and you can get lost. You're like a little fish in a big pond, and more so if you're a blues singer, a blues musician. So I was not really wanting to be a crossover [artist], actually. But I wanted all people to hear it and like it; I was hoping, rather, that they would like it. People like Ray Charles, people like Chuck Berry, all these guys to me were very talented ... all of them were very energetic when it comes to playing music. They didn't play the slow, droopy-drawers music like I did, so I found that maybe that was my reason: that they had things that I didn't have. I was never envious of them, because me, I'm the country boy that left the country but they never got the country out of me, so I didn't have that stage presence that they have. So I was never envious of them being able to get over [to younger audiences], but I would hope that people sometime would pay more attention to what I was doing. "I'm the country boy that left the country but they never got the country out of me." On the best advice his manager gave him There used to be a saying that if a black performer — it was four theaters you had to play and be accepted before you would be accepted as a true entertainer. One of those theaters was the Howard Theatre in Washington, the Royal Theater in Baltimore and the master itself was the Apollo Theater in New York, in Harlem. ... The fourth theater was the Regal Theater in Chicago. My manager said, "Do not go to New York trying to be Nat Cole or anybody else that's trying to be slick, because there are people that are sweeping the floors that are much better than you'll ever be. So the best thing for you to do is go there and be B.B. King. Sing '3 O'Clock Blues'; sing the songs that you sing the way you sing them. All these other people can do all of those other things, but they can't be you as you can be you." That I've tried to keep from then until now. |
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