I've been enjoying some Facebook Live moments from the Orangeville Blues & Jazz festival - that's a festival I've played for the last few years but not this time - and it would be wrong to start thinking one was "entitled" to play a festival just because you've played it the last few years.
I remember last year - I must have had 4 plays and if it hadn't been for Joel coming with me to drive and shlepp the gear, it would have near killed me. I remember I was pretty wiped when I got back home.
I guess I'm just getting old...Last week for the first time in my career I went to a venue, took down the posters and told the bartender I wouldn't be back. It wasn't because I was greeted by complaints that our jam would interfere with the Raptors game on TV, or that they shortchanged me on my fee. It was just way too exhausting to bring in a PA, two amps and three guitars and play all night long (we don't take many breaks at the Campfire Jam). I was totally wiped out the next day. If we're going to be doing any more touring, it'll have to be a "Blues Elders" package with roadies to carry the gear and pass out the Metamucil. And if there's any groupies coming around they better bring the Viagra :-)
I still think there's room for me in the Blues Diaspora. How often do you get to hear slow-cooked grooves of a guitar player who's been perfecting the same riffs (on the same guitar) for fifty years without ever having the benefit of a lesson or the burden of a rehearsal.
If this is a new chapter in my music career, I figured I needed a new bio so this is what I scratched out the other night:
Brian Blain jokes that he had his "15 minutes of fame" back in the 70s and it wouldn't be fair to take up too much limelight with so many hopefuls trying to get their music heard. Instead he's been more focused on encouraging and introducing new and not-so-new talent through his behind-the-scenes efforts as an editor, publisher, blogger and hosting his popular Blues Campfires.
(I guess I'm going to have to flesh that out a little)