When? Sat 17/05/2008
Where? Festivaltent Toon mij een kaart
Fantastic Festival, But Who Expected Otherwise?
Excellent line-up, quality based on originality, variation and authenticity: Spring Blues in the year 2008 was, looking back on this 21st edition, it was one of the best blues festivals ever in this area. Despite the pessimistic weather forecast, above they clearly thought otherwise; the clouds above Ecaussinnes looked sometimes threatening, but the sun showed itself regularly.
And so it became a quarter to two, André Hobus was itching to hold his first speech, which resulted in the announcement of The Boogie Woogie Jumpers. Aricia Evlard, a young piano crack performed, backed by Vincent Moreau (drums) and Sandro Cancelli (upright bass) a very energetic and diverse show. The early birds, as many as a couple of hundred people, were richly rewarded for their presence right from the start. While announcing her own composition ‘Movin’ On’, Aricia measured the atmosphere among the audience, she rather would like everybody to dance to her swinging boogie woogie rhythms, and not much later she showed how to do it herself, but in vain. ‘Hounddog’, starting with a remarkable bass line, sounded different, because of the use of felt headed drums sticks, but really demonstrated the vocal qualities of Aricia. The trio showed without question that they were having a good time, the spontaneous smile to Vincent during the dual sung ‘Is That Girl’ leaves nothing to the imagination. This strong Belgian opener got a well deserved applause, the encore was indisputably deserved.
At most twenty minutes of interval music, the change of the setting to Kirk ‘Eli’ Fletcher goes fairly fast. Fletcher performs with a Norwegian trio, namely: Per Erstad (bass), Iver Erstad (Hammond B3) and Jon Furulund (drums). Kirk belongs to the category of top guitarists, among others the Fabulous Thunderbirds are on his C.V. Without one vocal note this man filled one full hour with a lot of passion with strictly instrumental tunes, from West Coast Swing to Funky rhythms. The audience stayed interested ‘til the end, also caused by the interesting interaction between Kirk and Iver (on a genuine B3), instigated by the rhythm section; a very basic drum kit (bass/floor/snare drums with some cymbals) were enough for Jon to create a full sound. The missing vocal dimension didn’t unbalance the set, which was expressed by the encouraging response from the ever increasing audience, enough for an encore.
After another quick change of the stage set-up, the time schedule was guarded very strict, Fred Brousse (harmonica, guitar), coming from Lyon, together with Luc Blackstone (bass) and Ced’ SanJuan (drums), kicked off with a solid warming up to prepare the audience for the arrival of two giants of stature. This trio didn’t play together for the first time, so it couldn’t go wrong. Add Maurice John Vaughn and B.J. Emery and the next hour couldn’t fail. Outside it started to rain a little bit, but nobody cares. Maurice, perfectly dressed in a tailor made suit, started on guitar and would handle a big part of the vocals during the course of the concert, but also demonstrated his skills on piano and sax. Maurice and B.J., no strangers to each other neither, are obviously ready for it and B.J. urged the audience at the start of ‘Talk To Me Baby’, by saying “The blues is in the house today, put your hands together” to them. A bit later, on a funky bass line, we did catch Bruce, B.J. and Maurice on cheerful and well accomplished rhythmic dance steps. When B.J. plays a solo on his trombone he blows the instrument with such power that two oranges would fit in his mouth. ‘Mama She Believed In Me’ Maurice dedicated to his mother, followed by ‘How Many More Years’, preceded by the announcement that Maurice admires the work Howlin’ Wolf very much. By the way, the intro on the guitar was shot stuff, like the outro on saxophone in the next song, encouraged by the audience with a spontaneously, supporting hand clapping. The saxophone was initially badly mixed in the sound, but this was rapidly fixed by the crew, which was responsible for the sound, and did a very reasonable job by the way. Two songs from Maurice’s latest CD, entitled ‘In The Shadow Of The City’, especially the boogie woogie Jimmy Walker’s ‘Small Town Baby’ and the song ‘Got To Be Funky’, separated by B.B. King’s ‘Why I Sing The Blues’, were the finale of this very good concert.
After a short break, just long enough to have a short stay outside the tent and to conclude that the sun was beating the rain, we were ready for four musicians from ‘motorcity’ Detroit (MI). Seward “Harmonica” Shah is a gifted harmonica player and besides that, he has a good voice. Together with Harry Oman (guitar), R.J. Spanger (drums) and Chris Rumel (bass) he charmed the meanwhile extended audience. Chris Rumel works together with Shaw for over 20 years, the other band members joined a couple of years ago. For “I Want You To Love Me”, the Muddy Waters tune, he picked a harmonica in the wrong key, but due to his professionalism, hardly anybody noticed, he improvised a melody in a creative way and then, like nothing was wrong, he picked the right harmonica. ‘Baby, Scratch My Back’, with a catchy melody and nice groove, the commonly known ‘Key To The Highway’ and ‘Everything Gonna Be Alright, to mention some, were part of a not in advance agreed set-list, according to Shah. ”We have no special plan, we just play the blues”, he said. André Hobus waved him goodbye by stating: “Harmonica Shah, old fashion blues, old school blues”. The performance of this artist couldn’t be better described. Later Chris entrusted me to be very happy to perform in Europe, in Detroit the blues scene is down, only in the southern and western States this music is still alive.
Sean Carney had to do the job without Gene “King Sax” Walker. Due to health problems, the last mentioned was hospitalized in Germany. Together with Bill Stuve (bass) and Eric Blume (drums) he would overcome this setback in style. Even more, this would become one of the highlights of the day. Eventually intimate and quiet, with the accent on depth in performance, and finishing with a crackling finale with lots of musical fireworks. Sean anticipated cleverly to the, typical for this festival, interested audience. Three men in striped tailor made suits, Sean and Eric with dark sunglasses, enchained the audience for one and a half hour. When Bill sings a song, Sean lays his guitar of his shoulder and blindly plays a riff. Halfway the set, after ‘Too Many Cooks’ (Robert Cray) , Sean dedicated Little Milton’s ‘That Will Never Do’ to Gene Walker. On ‘29 Ways’ Bill and Eric played a solo, Sean used this intermezzo to get rid of his coat and tie, his shirt is sweat soaked. This probably would also be the case with Eric, after he took on his drums like crazy and the stage manager had to send somebody to put things back in order. After the discharging ‘Oh Yeah’, Sean pulled out all the stops for the thundering final ‘Why Did You Lie’. As “the new king of swing” he was called back for an encore.
It was just before nine o’clock when Tom Rigney, backed by a number of excellent musicians under the name Flambeau, set the tent on fire. The music is as flamboyant as the man himself, dressed in black pants, ditto T-shirt, topped by a long apron, with multiple flashing colors. Put this band on a folk- or bluegrass festival and you are guaranteed an excited dancing crowd. But in this tent in Ecaussinnes a minority is ascending this music. Through a number of styles with cajun, zydeco, funk, mardi gras, blues and folk, with originals like ‘Drivin’ That Thing’ and ‘Guinness And Gumbo’, as well as classics as ‘Milk Cow Blues’, ‘Jambalaya (On The Bayou)’ and ‘House Of The Rising Sun’, he entertained his audience in a fantastic way. Tom was during this festival the only artist, who stepped off the stage to greet his spectators. A one and half hour top level show. Rigney & Flambeau did appeal to young and old, without doubt a cherry on this up till then delicious pie.
For the final act of the day we had to wait for fifteen minutes, what is acceptable for “The top of the bill”. On the other hand the audience already had enjoyed a long and musically rewarding day. Therefore it would be better no to let them wait longer as necessary. Rod Piazza and his Mighty Flyers started with ‘Hip Shake’, including the medley sauce. Rod used this show to promote his latest CD ‘ThrillVille’ (2007), but also made room for his older work, including covers. So we got to hear version number two of ‘Key To The Highway’. After Honey (Alexander) Piazza plugged in a cable in another input of her keyboard, we were treated on heavy cracking from the speakers, which only disappeared after she put the plug back in the original input. It was obvious that it suddenly went a lot louder, the volume knobs were used eagerly to lesser pleasure of my inner ears.
Without being too critical, there were fine musical moments during Piazza’s set, but I have the opinion that the fire was down a little bit. It was overdone, inclined to over-acting. About twelve-thirty Rod introduced all the Mighty Flyers with a short intermission, after which they left the stage one by one. As the only one left on stage he then played a very impressive harmonica solo. After that we had the final, again with the complete band and a lot of decibels. When André Hobus asked if we wanted another one, there was a positive reaction from the meanwhile depleted audience. To emphasize this Rod asked the audience the same question, and in reply received a loud “Yes”. Short before one o’clock it’s over, but Rod didn’t fully convince me, it probably may be me, but I have the feeling I noticed better performances during the day.
To stay with performances, I sure like to give my appreciation to the organizer and his team for this extremely cozy and perfectly organized festival. If we take in account the choice of artists, reception, the swift proceedings and the location Spring Blues deserves without question an excellent grade. There was a good crowd, and for those who weren’t there, think about it for next year, there is plenty of room for you in the tent. And for those who heard some rumors … there is a 22nd edition coming. And now on our way home, Mons, Doornik… these name signs are flashing by in the darkness of the highway…
Translation by: Ton Kok
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