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" . . . it was no problem to sit on the ground close to the stage, drink a beer and listen to Blind Mississippi Morris or Jack Owens play their old style blues. "
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By Ross Gohlke
It was a perfect day, as far as festival days go, but not just because of the weather. The sun was shining and the grass on the levee slope was green, true. And a pleasant breeze to keep things temperate had something to do with it. But what really made the 10th Annual King Biscuit Blues Festival, Oct. 6-8, was the people - the fans, the organizers, the locals. Unlike other music types, blues fans don`t seem to need much more than the music they love. In a mixed crowd of a hundred people, you`d be hard pressed to pick the blues lovers solely by their clothing or hairstyle. Well, for three days the 80,000 blues lovers who converged on Helena, Ark., seemed like one big happy family, without even trying. There was no nostalgic media hype; no promises that the event would somehow bring us a better future; there were no ultra-famous faces. What the King Biscuit Blues Festival had, whether by intention or luck, was the perfect atmosphere to enjoy some incredible music. And incredible music is only one of the things this festival had. With live acts running at various times from about noon to midnight on four stages, the festival brought in regional and national performers of electric blues, gospel, and Delta blues. Saturday night`s top billing went to Buddy Guy, who provided one of the only dampers to the festival`s peaceful easy feeling when his bodyguards demanded that everyone in the backstage area (including blues great Robert Jr. Lockwood and blues photographer extraordinaire Dick Waterman) stand behind a trailer while Buddy made his grand entrance. As for the rest of Saturday night`s performers, they came to play and play they did: Otis Clay, Anson Funderberg and the Rockets, Rod Piazza and the Mighty Flyers, Joe Louis Walker, to name of a few. Many of the festival`s acts play Beale Street on a regular basis, and it was a reality check to see them playing before 50,000 people, many from Europe and other corners of the world, without missing a beat. The moral, at this point of the story, is that Memphis blues performers are among the best performers in the world; they can play any time, anywhere, to any number of people. The next time you groan when a visiting friend asks you to go to Beale, think about that. One of the truly delightful experiences of the festival was wandering into a back alley where a loading dock was the setting for The Houston Stackhouse Acoustic Stage. The sound system wasn`t sufficient, and when John Hammond came on, the space wasn`t sufficient either. But earlier in the day it was no problem to sit on the ground close to the stage, drink a beer and listen to Blind Mississippi Morris or Jack Owens play their old style blues. The food and craft booths sprawled down the length of Cherry Street, Helena`s main street, which is separated from a view of the Mississippi River only by a massive levee. The levee`s town-side grassy slope acted as sort of a huge outdoor amphitheater where the crowds spread blankets and faced the main stage, the town of Helena, and the setting sun. After the sun descended behind the buildings, and before the autumn chill of darkness set in, there were a couple of hours of pure blues bliss. There was no such thing as a bad seat, another unusual situation for a large festival. Even the vendors, notorious for turning festivals into an expensive hassle, only enhanced the positive vibes - from exotic drinks served in coconut shells, to a large plywood fish which children were invited to paint with hand prints, to the neighborhood drugstore and liquor store which stayed open late and didn`t jack prices up, to the vast selection of foods available, to the uninvited street musicians. All the sights, sounds, smells and friendly conversations of the 10th Annual King Biscuit Blues Festival made festival-going seem, believe it or not, fun.
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