[Source: The Blues Foundation]
Taj Mahal, the blues legend whose vibrant, worldly music encompassed African-rooted sounds of all kinds, will be inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.
Mahal, whose real name is Henry St. Clair Fredericks, has been selected along with New Orleans soul singer Irma Thomas, Chicago bluesman Son Seals and ragtime guitar player Rev. Gary Davis to join the Blues Hall in Memphis, Tenn. They will be inducted in a ceremony on May 6, which will be followed the day after by the Blues Foundation's 30th annual Blues Music Awards.
"I'm very happy that a group of my peers think it's something I deserve after the years I've put into the music," said Mahal, 66, speaking by phone from the San Francisco Bay area.
California is one place Mahal has spent a lot of time, though the nearly nomadic singer-guitarist notes: "I pretty much move around wherever I like."
The same could be said of Mahal's music, which has for four decades dug deeply into sounds of many places, particularly Africa, the Caribbean and Hawaii. The breadth of Mahal's influences came partly from his heritage and partly from a nurtured openness.
Boston Herald, United States
But Italy's top blues star, who plans to perform at venues across town in the next three weeks, geography proved no barrier to his passion for the deeply American music he discovered as a teen. "When I listened to my first blues song, I said, ...
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Schenectady Gazette, NY
Most people know George Thorogood as the voice and guitarist behind "Bad to the Bone" and other blues rock hits. But deep down, Thorogood might just have the heart and mind of a comedian.
Dan Auerbach (via last.fm)
Earvolution
The two-piece from Akron, Ohio, has a raw and rollicking sound that is perhaps the most derivative, in today's digital era, of Hendrix's fusion of psychedelic guitar fuzz and delta blues..
Dallas Morning News
Music began to envelop her life after she enrolled in Radcliffe College in 1967 and became a "stone social activist, majoring in social relations and political action.
Virginia bluesman John Cephas passed away at his home today, March 4 at age 78. He died of natural causes. He had retired from live performance very recently due to illness. He was the recipient of the Library of Virginia's 2009 African American Trailblazers in Virginia History award just last week. The award meant so much to him. It was one of many awards John Cephas had received of the course of his career. John Cephas was a very generous man. He gave much of himself to his fans and student...
James Hunter keeps soul alive - CNN
... dressing room at the Sunset Strip's House of Blues, sitting in a throne-like chair festooned with Mexican Day of the Dead skulls.
