In just a few days we’ll be back in this beautiful country with our long time friends who produce the fabulous, Lucerne Blues Festival. We’ll be on the same stage with many other notable blues artists from around the world. We cannot love or praise this festival more if we tried, but we’ll give it a whirl!
As you may know that over the years, many Blues & Jazz artists have had tremendous success in Europe and in many cases even more than in their own U.S. While we count ourselves very fortunate to tour the world for over 40 years we also know that things are cyclical – they wax and wane. We’ve had long droughts in certain cities, states and countries. We’ve also been to some countries multiple times: Germany, Switzerland, Ukraine and Paraguay, Australia and Brazil where we’ve lost count. We were last in Lucerne at this fest in 2017.
Blues & Zydeco in the U.S. live side by side in most places. They are at bottom, Black American Music. Millions of people understand that the foundation and roots of American music is blues. The late, great Willie Dixon coined this perfect phrase to underscore this theory:
“The Blues are the roots, the rest are the fruits.”
Swiss and European audiences love American blues and roots music. True story. They have studied it, consumed it deeply and passionately, and understand the history, b/c they understand how much history matters. Their history is some of the oldest in the world.
So, when we get to experience this unique and wonderful country, twice in one year within 7 months of each other – we gotta pause and say out loud – “swweeeeet” Counting the days until we blow outta here again for another transatlantic flight to visit this magical place with its marvelous people!