Slide Guitar Workshop with Michael Messer & Chris Eaton
Published September 21, 2011 |
An afternoon of tuition, demonstrations and discussions from two slide guitar specialists.
Acoustic, electric, bottleneck and lap styles will be explored.
Beginners, intermediate or advanced players welcome.
12 – 4.30pm.
£40 per person. Tickets limited, advance booking required.
Please email Chris for payment details (chriseaton666@hotmail.com)
“Michael Messer is a virtuoso slide guitarist. His playing encompasses the
entire history of the blues but is totally individual and contemporary. The American magazine ‘Spirit’ listed Michael as one of the greatest slide guitarists ever alongside Duane Allman and Ry Cooder”…Dave Tracey
The Michael Messer ‘MM’ range of resonator guitars are fast becoming brand leaders in the acoustic resonator guitar market around the world.
www.michaelmesser.co.uk
“Chris Eaton’s slide playing is truly exemplary, he has a passion in his playing to match his formidable technique”…Blues In Britain
Chris is a member of the Registry of Guitar Tutors and has taught for the Academy of Contemporary Music, the International Guitar Foundation and the Academy of Music and Sound. As a session player he has opened shows for many guitar greats, such as Peter Green, Sonny Landreth and Seasick Steve.
www.eatonguitar.moonfruit.com
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The Star, in the heart of Guildford, has been entertaining the people of the town for more than 400 years and is proudly continuing that tradition as the area’s longest-running live music venue.
Close to the vibrant shopping district, river and Guildford Castle, the 16th century pub is split over three levels and has been refurbished to the highest standards while maintaining many historic features.
The pub reputedly has its own ghost – a man in uniform who sometimes chats to guests.
With a real fire, an intimate courtyard and a host of snug and cosy corners, it is a great place to relax, to soak up the atmosphere and to enjoy traditional pub food and distinctive cask ale.
Food is served from noon to 6pm every day in the cosy areas within the pub, next to the wood-burning stove or on the secluded outside terrace courtyard.
Expect unpretentious, good pub food with the emphasis on traditional favourites, freshly-prepared from good quality ingredients.
A good selection of wines by the glass, traditional Kentish cask beers and distinctive lagers complement the extensive menu, which offers hot and cold food to suit all tastes.
www.starinnguildford.co.uk
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GUITAR STAR TO LAUNCH NEW BBC SESSIONS ALBUM AT ICONIC, RESCUED LONDON VENUE
Published September 19, 2011 |
Less than a year ago, The Times of London, no less, ecstatically described guitarist Stephen Dale Petit and his 100 Club-saving concert as an “axe maestro and gig worthy of a place in 100 Club folklore”…
**Saturday, October 8th 2011 sees his triumphant return to that legendary venue**
Fresh back from recording his next (as yet untitled but slated for early 2012 release) album in Nashville, Tennessee with producer Vance (Kings of Leon, Willie Nelson, Alicia Keyes, The Dead Weather, Buddy Guy, Keith Richards etc…) Powell at the controls and input & inspiration from the likes of Jack White, Martina McBride and Dave Stewart, Stephen Dale Petit unveils the release of not one, but two, albums in the next six months!
At the much anticipated 100 Club date, Petit will be showcasing tracks from both the Nashville album and the November 2011 release Stephen Dale Petit - The BBC Sessions which features his guest appearances on BBC Radio 2’s Paul Jones Rhythm & Blues and Bob Harris Shows. As with the 100 Club gig so beloved of many daily newspapers, the BBC Sessions also contain some stunning contributions from ex-Rolling Stone Mick Taylor.
Petit’s first two albums Guitararama and The Crave enjoyed commercial success and scooped Album of the Year Awards from magazines ranging from Guitar & Bass to Classic Rock and Mojo (who dubbed him ‘Guitar Hero 2011’) and enthusiastic full features in daily newspapers from The Sunday Express to theIndependent and the Times.
Highly acclaimed past SDP sets at the 100 Club have seen guest appearances from, amongst others, Ronnie Wood, Mick Taylor, Phil May and Chris Barber. TheOctober 8th gig will witness another incendiary set from Petit and his new, young band (average age 23) as they once again set the club alight with both new and classic material and judging by past events, appearances from a surprise guest or two.
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PLUMPTON BLUES FEST, UK’S NEWEST FEST KICKS OFF IN STYLE!
Published August 22, 2011 | 
Wilko Johnson talks about his forthcoming tour
Published August 20, 2011 |
Former Dr Feelgood guitarist Wilko Johnson talks about his forthcoming tour and about his time with Dr. Feelgood, modern technology, Norman Wattroy, Dylan Howe and much more …
More info
AUGUST BANK HOLIDAY BLUES SPECIAL AT ABBEY FEST!
Published August 20, 2011 |
The forecast for August Bank Holiday is good and the music promises to be even better. The ever popular Abbey Fest at Merton Abbey MIlls in London SW19 has a great line up of classic blues & R&B, running from Friday 27th to Monday 29th August. Some of the finest up and coming acts in the UK will grace the stages of the bandstand and the lovely Colorhouse Theatre.
The Line-up includes -The Robin Bibi Band with guitar master Robin Bib, Bad Influence featuring the wonderful blonde bombshell Val Cowell, Crosstown Traffic with Charles Shar Murray and Buffalo Bill Smith, Elephant Shelf featuring the boogie piano and red-hot fiddle of Diana Stone, Roadhouse with the elementally powerful guitar of Danny Gwylim, Incredible Blues Puppies with harmonica virtuoso Alan Glen, the Dave Raphael band with (yes you got it) Dave Raphael, B’Mused, and others.
Bandstand events are free Colorhouse Theatre events incurr a door charge – BOX Office is 0208 542 5511 and a full list of events is on www.abbeyfest.co.uk
More info
Greystones takes over where The Boardwalk left off
Published July 29, 2011 |
LEADING SHEFFIELD BOOKER CHRIS WILSON’S SUCCESSFUL NEW VENTURE – The Greystones takes over where The Boardwalk left off
Sheffield live music fans disappointed by the closure of the Boardwalk will be delighted to know that Chris Wilson who ran the venue for 15 years, is up and running again as part of a successful new venture at the GREYSTONES Sheffield, S11 7BS.
Again it’s a live music seven nights a week place but Chris doesn’t have to run all of them. “I’ve joined forces with Thornbridge Brewery and four other promoters are involved on different nights. This is fantastic for me; it leaves me free to concentrate on the music, maintaining the very highest quality on the nights I promote.”
The gig list certainly bears that out with Steve Tilson, Larry Miller, Dana Gillespie, Wilko Johnson, Michael Chapman among the acts booked over the next few months.
Chris is one of the most respected music promoters in the North of England; he didn’t go into detail about the closure of the Boardwalk, saying only;
‘A very hurtful series of events surrounding the renewal of the lease in February this year forced me and my family out.’ He also noted: ‘…those involved had seriously underestimated the strength of feeling the events aroused among music fans, the Sheffield media and public.’
The search for a new venue was urgent ‘When it all occurred I had 200 shows booked in for 2011’ said Chris. ‘But thankfully I personally knew most of the acts involved like Wilko Johnson and the Nimmo Brothers.
I rang them all and when asked what I’d do next I said ‘Well I’ve got this friend who runs a venue called the Greystones, and they all said go for it.’ The Greystones used to be known as the Highcliffe which until a few years ago had hosted a famous folk club. Thornbridge Brewery took over the failing Highcliffe in November 2010. They re-named it and re-opened the music room so already establishing itself the venue was the ideal opportunity for Chris to re-locate to.
The dust has settled and the new venture is going well, ‘It’s a great gig, like a mini Boardwalk; same layout and great vibe.’
There have already been several sell-out shows including Wilko Johnson ‘Both Wilko and Norman Watt-Roy raved about the venue’ said Chris. He’s got a lot more to tell us about his memories of the Boardwalk and the great artists he’s worked with and will be talking to us in due course but meanwhile we wish Chris & family every success.
Here’s a list of the shows booked so far – it’s looking really good for Blues & Rock fans.
Aug 21 the Hamsters, last Sheffield gig; Aug 24, Hamilton Loomis.
Sep 7 Bob Log III, Sep11 Steve Tilston, Sep 25 Nimmo Brothers, Sep 30 Larry Miller Oct 3 Heidi Talbot + Boo Hewerdine + John McCusker, Oct 5 Frank Vignola Trio, Oct 10 Sleeping Dogz, Oct 11 Hank Wangford, Oct12 Catfish Keith, Oct 18 Michael Chapman + Rita Hosking, Oct 24 Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band, Oct 26 Stephen Fearing + And More info
Beth Hart & Joe Bonamassa team-up on new album “Don’t Explain”
Published July 18, 2011 |
On Monday 26th September by Provogue Records release ‘Don’t Explain’ the
debut album collaboration between American singer-songwriter Beth Hart and
the acclaimed rock /blues guitarist Joe Bonamassa. The album is made up of
intimate soul cover versions and will be released in the UK and Europe.
The album is produced by Kevin Shirley who produced albums for Aerosmith,
Black Country Communion, The Black Crowes and John Hiatt. The album
perfectly combines Beth Hart’s soulful vocal with Joe’s guitar sound to
produce a superb collection of hand-picked soul covers from such as Gil
Scott-Heron, Tom Waits, Etta James, Aretha Franklin and others.
Joe has crossed paths with Beth and her band numerous times on the road, he
recalls how ‘Don’t Explain’ came about; “I was up late one night, I couldn’t
sleep. I was playing songs on my iPod from the reissue of Get Yer Ya-Ya’s
Out, which included all the opening acts from that Stones show. As soon as
the Ike & Tina tracks came on, I just said out loud, ‘Beth Hart.’ I emailed
Kevin, saying, ‘let’s do a soul covers record with Beth,’ and he replied
back, ‘Actually, that’s a great idea.’”
To read the full tracklisting and further info -
http://www.noblepr.co.uk/Press_Releases/provogue/hart-bonamassa.htm
More info
Peyton On Patton: New Big Damn Band CD Pays Tribute to the King of the Delta Blues
Published May 20, 2011 |
CLARKSDALE, MISSISSIPPI (May 11, 2011) – A lot of folks will tell you that Robert Johnson was the King of the Delta Blues. But for god’s sake don’t say it in front of Reverend Peyton.
The guitar-wielding leader of The Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band has no problem praising Johnson and his incredible body of work. “But there’s only one King of the Delta Blues, and his name was Charley Patton,” Peyton said. “I’ll go toe-to-toe with anyone who says different.” This summer Peyton and his band will release a powerful tribute to their hero in the form of Peyton on Patton. The 13-track CD will exclusively feature songs written and recorded by Patton during his brief recording career, which came to an end upon his premature death in 1934. Peyton on Patton will be released July 19 by SideOneDummy Records.
(Photo of Peyton by Bill Steber)
During his lifetime and for nearly a quarter of a century afterward, Charley Patton was regarded almost universally as the preeminent Delta bluesman. He spent his formative years at Dockery Plantation near Ruleville, Mississippi, where he influenced future blues and gospel stars including the aforementioned Robert Johnson, as well as Son House, Willie Brown, Pops Staples, John Lee Hooker and Howlin’ Wolf. His flamboyant performance style was widely emulated and his songs frequently covered. During a five-year period, Patton recorded nearly 60 songs for Paramount Records.
The new CD Peyton on Patton features a number of Patton’s best-loved blues songs including “A Spoonful Blues,” “Mississippi Boweavil Blues” and “Tom Rushen Blues,” as well as Patton-penned spirituals like “Jesus Is A Dying Bed Maker,” “Prayer of Death, Part 1” and “You’re Gonna Need Someone (When You Come to Die)”. The CD also includes three radically different versions of “Some of These Days I’ll Be Gone” featuring varying instrumentation and recorded in different keys and arrangements.
“We set out to do this as right as we could,” Peyton said. “I am a songwriter and an artist, but for this I wanted to stay as true to Charley’s music as I could. We recorded the entire record in one day with one microphone in the great state of Indiana, the same way Charley’s first recordings were done.”
Although Patton sometimes recorded with other musicians, Rev. Peyton regards his hero’s solo recordings as his best. For that reason, the Peyton on Patton CD is a largely solo affair with Reverend Peyton’s growling vocals and searing guitar work placed front and center. But while the rest of the Big Damn Band are used sparingly, they make a number of crucial contributions to the record. Washboard Breezy – wife of Reverend Peyton – contributes washboard percussion on just a couple of tracks, but her vocals on “Elder Greene Blues” are a highlight of the disc. Aaron “Cuz” Persinger, whose thundering drums More info
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUDDY WATERS 4 April 2011
Published April 5, 2011 |
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUDDY WATERS 4 April 2011
4 April 20ll was the birthday of Muddy Waters, the Father figure of modern blues. Muddy was born in 1913 and would have been 98 today. He was the main reason for Chess records getting established as Marshall Chess described it ‘He was our first real star’ and was the author of numerous of the R&B classics that were the staple diet of British bands during the 60’s R&B boom – ‘Got My Mojo Working’, ‘Mannish Boy’, ‘Hoochie Coochie Man’ and numerous others.
This article is taken from Muddy’s official website (there’s a link at the bottom of the page) and is written by Pete Welding, taken from ‘Gone to Main Street’ published by Bluesland, E.P. Dutton, 1992
Anyone who’s followed the course of modern popular music is aware of the vast influence exerted on its development by the large numbers of blues artists who collectively shaped and defined the approach to amplified music in the late 1940s and early ’50s. Chicago was the pivotal point for the development and dissemination of the modern blues and virtually everything else has flowed, in one way or another, from this rich source.
The revolution began inauspiciously enough in 1948 with the release of a 78-rpm single by a singer-guitarist called Muddy Waters. Coupled on Aristocrat 1305 were a pair of traditional Mississippi Delta-styled pieces “I Cant Be Satisfied” and “I Feel Like Going Home,” and on them Waters’ dark, majestic singing. Waters’ use of amplification gave his guitar playing a new, powerful, striking edge and sonority that introduced to traditional music a sound its listeners found very exciting, comfortably familiar yet strangely compelling and, above all, immensely powerful, urgent.
From the start it was he who dominated the music, who led the way-in style, sound, repertoire, instrumentation, in every way-first as a greatly popular club performer from the mid-1940s on and, a few years later, as the most influential recording artist in the new amplified blues idiom. In the years 1948-55 he put forth for definition the fundamental approaches and usages of modern blues in a remarkable series of ground-breaking and, as time has shown, classic records. In the years since, the style Waters delineated has been extended, fragmented, elaborated and otherwise commercialized, but the fundamental earthy, vital, powerful sound of the postwar blues as defined by Muddy and his bandsmen has yet to be excelled-or even equaled, come to that. It’s no accident The Rolling Stones chose their name from one of Waters’ finest early recordings the choice was merely prophetic, for Muddy and his magnificent bedrock music continue to resonate as thrillingly and powerfully through the music of today as they did back in the late ’40s and early ’50s when we first heard them.
He was born McKinley Morganfield-Muddy Waters is More info
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Another Harvest of the best of British Blues
Following the resounding success of this year’s UK-wide search for Britain’s best emerging Blues talent, the world-renowned Harvest Jazz & Blues Festival in New Brunswick, Canada, is launching, for the second year running, its ‘New Brunswick Battle of the Blues’. The competition is looking for unsigned bands and artists creating original, quality music and the winner will be showcased on a world stage at the Festival in September 2012.
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