Medellin’s 1st annual Blues Festival comes to town

The Medellin Blues Festival 2011 has come rollin’ into town and will be jammin’ from Tuesday August 23 until Saturday August 27.

The Blues Festival is the first annual production of it’s kind in Medellin and marks an important cultural movement for the city. Over the next six days of the festival, there will be music playing as well as other fun activities such as harmonica workshops, art expositions, conversations, and interactions of all kinds, reported El Colombiano.

“Blues is sadness, it’s wailing, and it’s a prayer. It was born a cappella, in the black voices on cotton and tobacco plantations in Mississippi, Virginia, Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama, and the south of the United States. Blues is emotion, it’s feelings, it’s soul, passion, and it defines those who have listened to it, now with white voices accompanied by electric guitars, harmonicas, and the occasional saxophone,” reported El Mundo news.

Blues music represents the roots of many different genres of contemporary music, including rock, jazz, funk, country, heavy metal, and reggae, and continues to inspire artists and listeners from all over the world. Famous blues musicians include B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Robert Johnson, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Albert King, Muddy Waters, and Eric Clapton.

Blues Festival Event Program:

Storytelling, “black stories about blue cotton”

Where: Acontista Café. Calle 53 No. 43-81.
When:
Tuesday 7:30PM

Blues documentary showing
Where: Colombo Americano.
When:
Wednesday 2PM

Harmonica workshop
Where: Universidad Nacional, núcleo El Volador.
When:
Thursday 4PM

Closing concert
Ft. Blues Boy Trio, The Blue Jam Company, Invitado en Blanco, and Knuto y Santiago: The Crossblues Band.
Where: Teatro Lido.
When:
Saturday 6PM

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