The outcome was in doubt for a while, but the Chicago Blues Festival has weathered the city’s budget crisis for another year and remains a freestanding, three-day event (it was shortened from four days in 2009). The challenge for the festival programmers at the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events—a hybrid of the Department of Cultural Affairs and the Mayor’s Office of Special Events, formed by bizarre bureaucratic wrangling last year—is to fill those three days with interesting music using starkly limited resources. The solution, once again, has been to focus on local and regional acts, with a handful of carefully selected marquee attractions from out of town. The resulting mix of traditional 12-bar blues and modern southern soul-blues should appeal to most if not all of the festival’s usual audience, though it should be noted that there are plenty of more iconoclastic blues-based artists out there—some of them experimenting with ideas borrowed from hip-hop—who have yet to get their day in the sun at Grant Park.
The layout of the festival is similar to what it’s been in the past. The Petrillo Music Shell, where most of the bigger names play, is just northeast of Columbus and Jackson. The Front Porch Stage, which features mostly acoustic artists and smaller bands, is on the lawn south of Jackson and east of Columbus. The Crossroads Stage is at the east end of Jackson at Lake Shore Drive. The Mississippi Juke Joint, which this year hosts the panel discussions and presentations formerly held at the Route 66 Roadhouse tent, is on Columbus between Jackson and Congress, just east of the Lincoln statue. On Columbus between Jackson and Monroe, nonprofits such as the Koko Taylor Celebrity Aid Foundation and the Windy City Blues Society will set up tents and booths, and WCBS is sponsoring a stage that will feature live blues all weekend. All events are free. —DW
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As usual, Chicago’s blues clubs will be going strong all weekend—the best known will be in the Reader‘s regular music listings. Buddy Guy’s Legends hosts a kickoff jam Wed 6/6 with the Brooks Family Blues Dynasty, Shemekia Copeland, Lurrie Bell, and many more; the club also presents music from 11 AM into the wee hours all three days of Blues Fest. Some venues not known for blues are also piggybacking on the festival: SPACE in Evanston has booked Charlie Musselwhite on Thu 6/7 and Joe Louis Walker on Sat 6/9, and the schedule at Reggie’s Music Joint includes a “Chicago Women in the Blues” showcase on Fri 6/8 and an afterparty on Sat 6/9 that doubles as Rockin’ Johnny Burgin’s celebration of his new album, Grim Reaper. (Both Musselwhite and Burgin appear in this week’s Artist on Artist.)
11:15 AM The Jimmy Reed Family
Mississippi Juke Joint Stage
4:30 PM Johnny Rawls
3 PM Matthew Skoller Band
