BOP Blues Club presented its 4th “Blues Week” this year and the festival is fast becoming an established part of the city’s annual events calendar.The current economic climate meant tighter purse strings than usual for the event, which relies heavily on sponsorship and a grant from NZCT (NZ Community Trust) enabled the festival to go ahead.
Headline act, Mojo Mama & the Hired Guns (with Bullfrog Rata), opened the festival on the Friday night.
Wellington’s Laura Collins brought her band of talented musicians to town and rocked the Belgian Bar.
With Bullfrog’s guitar and Cindy Muggeridge’s boogie piano playing, behind Collins’ passionate vocals, they presented a great show.
Appearing at the festival for the first time was “Isis Blue” featuring Tauranga’s Grant Haua on guitar and Rotorua’s Micky Ututaonga, Rob Patterson and singer Delaney Ututaonga.
Patterson and the Ututaongas are local musical giants, with big name band credits and frequent overseas tours on their CVs.
They presented a mix of soul and R&B, played with finesse to a packed bar.
They were followed by Rotorua’s Anton Elkington.
As well as his powerhouse trio, Anton’s young son, Eli did a brief cameo, singing and playing bass.
It’s wonderful to see father and son performing together on stage like this – and the crowd just loved it!
Local acts also drew a good following and included Rawiri Waru, Lindsay MacKenzie, Mike Garner, Peri Grant, Lyndsey Sinclair & Keith Garratt, the B-side Band, and Andrea Bailey and her band.
The final show on the Sunday night opened with “Ladies Sing The Blues”.
This featured BOP Blues Club female singers Lyndsey Sinclair, Jill Briar, Sally Garner and Andrea Bailey.
Each presented a short selection of songs, many telling the story of the blues from a female perspective, with songs such as “Dump That Chump”, “Love Me Like A Man”, “My Man Blues”, and so on.
Auckland’s “The Jukes” closed the festival, taking the stage late on Sunday night.
They had the crowd dancing and played two sets of all-classic blues songs, with oodles of Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon, Howling Wolf, Slim Harpo and many other classics covered. It was a strong ending to fantastic weekend, with blues fans from as far away as Canada, Auckland, Hamilton and Palmerston North, and even tourists from both Brazil and Russia all boogying to blues music!
Thanks to Mike Garner for the use of the article taken from B.O.P Blues Bulletin June-July 2009.
Check out the B.O.P Blues Club web site for more.
