Electric blues is blues music distinguished by the use of electric amplification for musical instruments. The guitar was the first instrument to be popularly amplified and used by early pioneers T-Bone Walker in the late 1930s and John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters in the 1940s. Their styles developed into West Coast blues, Detroit blues, and post-World War II Chicago blues, which differed from earlier, predominantly acoustic-style blues. By the early 1950s, Little Walter was a featured soloist on blues harmonica using a small hand-held microphone fed into a guitar amplifier. Although it took a little longer, the electric bass guitar gradually replaced the stand-up bass by the early 1960s. Electric organs and especially keyboards later became widely used in electric blues.
Massachusetts is a U.S. state in New England. The music of Massachusetts has developed actively since it was first colonized by Britain. The city of Boston is an especially large part of the state's present music scene, which includes several genres of rock, as well as classical, folk, and hip hop music.
Blues rock is a fusion genre and form of rock music that relies on the chords/scales and instrumental improvisation of blues. It is mostly an electric ensemble-style music with instrumentation similar to electric blues and rock. From its beginnings in the early to mid-1960s, blues rock has gone through several stylistic shifts and along the way it inspired and influenced hard rock, Southern rock, and early heavy metal.
The J. Geils Band was an American rock band formed in 1967, in Worcester, Massachusetts, under the leadership of guitarist John "J." Geils. The original band members included vocalist Peter Wolf, harmonica and saxophone player Richard "Magic Dick" Salwitz, drummer Stephen Bladd, vocalist/keyboardist Seth Justman, and bassist Danny Klein. Wolf and Justman served as principal songwriters. The band played R&B-influenced blues rock during the 1970s and soon achieved commercial success before moving toward a more mainstream radio-friendly sound in the early 1980s, which brought the band to its commercial peak. They performed a mix of cover songs of classic blues and R&B songs, along with original compositions written primarily by Wolf and Justman, as well as some group compositions written under the pseudonymous name Juke Joint Jimmy, representing compositions credited to the entire band as a whole. After Wolf left the band in 1983 to pursue a solo career, the band released one more album in 1984 with Justman on lead vocals, before breaking up in 1985. Beginning in 1999, the band had several reunions until the death of its namesake, J. Geils, on April 11, 2017.
William Haislip Squier is an American musician, singer, and songwriter who had a string of arena rock and crossover hits in the early 1980s. His best-known songs include "The Stroke", "Lonely Is the Night", "My Kinda Lover", "In the Dark", "Rock Me Tonite", "Everybody Wants You", "Emotions in Motion", "Love Is the Hero", and "Don't Say You Love Me". Squier's best-selling album, 1981's Don't Say No, is considered a landmark release of arena rock, bridging the gap between power pop and hard rock.
Ronnie Earl is an American blues guitarist and music instructor.
John Warren Geils Jr., known professionally as J. Geils or Jay Geils, was an American guitarist. He was known as the leader of the J. Geils Band.
Charles Alfred Leavell is an American musician. A member of the Allman Brothers Band throughout their commercial zenith in the 1970s, he subsequently became a founding member of the band Sea Level. He has served as the principal touring keyboardist and musical director of the Rolling Stones since 1982. As a session musician, Leavell has performed on every Rolling Stones studio album released since 1983 with the exception of Bridges to Babylon (1997). He has also toured and recorded with Eric Clapton, George Harrison, David Gilmour, Gov't Mule, Train, and John Mayer.
Sea Level was an American rock band from Macon, Georgia. Formed in 1976, the band was an offshoot of the Allman Brothers Band. Between 1977 and 1980, the band released five studio albums which incorporated elements of funk, blues and Latin music.
Randall Bramblett is an American musician and singer-songwriter, whose career as a solo artist, session player, and touring musician, has spanned more than three decades. He has worked with Gregg Allman, Bonnie Raitt, Goose Creek Symphony, Robbie Robertson, Elvin Bishop, Steve Winwood, Bonnie Bramlett, B.J. Thomas, Widespread Panic, Jay E. Livingston and Roger Glover. He plays keyboards, saxophones, flute, guitar, mandolin, and harmonica, and his songwriting is influenced by blues, folk, and gospel music.
Phil Walden was a co-founder of the Macon, Georgia-based Capricorn Records, along with former Atlantic Records executive Frank Fenter.
Deep Tracks is a Sirius XM Radio channel featuring lesser-known classic rock music selections such as album tracks, one-hit wonders, concert recordings, "forgotten 45s" and "B-side" tracks.
Benny Kay is an American recording artist and award-winning producer who has been creating music for over thirty years. Kay began his career in music by playing blues and barrelhouse piano at coffeehouses in the Boston, Massachusetts area. He became known for recording a risque version of Louis Armstrong's "Cheesecake", and appeared several times on the Joel "Fats" Rogers Show on WBCN in Boston. Kay recorded his first album for the Aladdin Records label, at the age of eighteen, serving as piano player for the seven-piece rhythm and blues band, Powerhouse. Among the highlights of the initial and subsequent Powerhouse releases are guest performances by Bull Moose Jackson and guitarist J. Geils. Over several years of regional touring with Powerhouse, Kay performed with or opened for Bonnie Raitt, Muddy Waters, James Cotton, Big Walter Horton, J. B. Hutto, John Lee Hooker, Frank Zappa, Captain Beefheart, Blood Sweat & Tears, NRBQ, Bob Margolin, Janis Ian, The Nighthawks and many others.
"Trouble No More" is an upbeat blues song first recorded by Muddy Waters in 1955. It is a variation on "Someday Baby Blues", recorded by Sleepy John Estes in 1935. The Allman Brothers Band recorded both studio and live versions of the song in the late 1960s and 1970s.
Hans Olson, is an American musician and songwriter. He is a singer and plays an amplified acoustic guitar and a harmonica in a neck rack. He is known as one of the best "harp-in-a-rack" players in the world. Olson helped to establish and organize the Phoenix Blues Society (1988), the Arizona Green Party (1991), the Arizona Blues Hall of Fame (1995), the Arizona Music Heritage Foundation and the Arizona Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame (2002). In 1996, Olson was inducted into the Arizona Blues Hall of Fame. Both Phoenix Magazine and Phoenix New Times named Olson as one of the most influential musicians in Arizona.
The Schaefer Music Festival in Central Park was a recurring music festival held in the summer between 1967 and 1976 at Wollman Rink in New York City's Central Park. It featured a number of notable performances. The sponsorship was taken over by Dr. Pepper in 1977 and the name changed to the Dr. Pepper Central Park Music Festival until the location of the festival was moved to Pier 84 in 1981 and the Wollman Skating Rink ceased being used as a concert venue.
Reese Wynans is an American keyboard player, who has done session work and has been a member of Double Trouble and progressive rock band Captain Beyond. In 2015, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Double Trouble.
Tony Braunagel is an American drummer, producer, and songwriter from Houston, Texas, United States, who is based in Los Angeles, California. Braunagel has played on many film scores and television shows as well as numerous albums as a musician, composer and producer. He is best known as a session drummer and/or percussionist of over 200 albums including those of Otis Rush, Eric Burdon, Johnny Nash, Coco Montoya, Lucky Peterson, as well as Grammy winning albums of Bonnie Raitt, Taj Mahal, Buddy Guy (percussion) and for performing live with dozens of music icons including Bonnie Raitt, Rickie Lee Jones, BB King, Lightnin’ Hopkins, John Lee Hooker, Robert Cray, Bette Midler, Lyle Lovett, and Taj Mahal to name just a few.
Jeff Pitchell is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, recording artist, instructor, and actor who is inducted into the Connecticut Blues Hall of Fame. He leads the band Jeff Pitchell and Texas Flood performing original and classic rock selections. Based in Rocky Hill, Connecticut, Pitchell has performed throughout the United States as well as internationally.
Douglas James Schlecht, known professionally as Doug James is an American blues and rhythm and blues baritone saxophonist, songwriter, arranger, record producer and audio engineer. In a career spanning 50 years, James has played on many albums, including those recorded by Roomful of Blues, Duke Robillard, Jimmie Vaughan, Joe Louis Walker, Colin James, Pat Benatar, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, and many others. In addition, James has released four albums bearing his name.
