Blues

Just when you thought the season of blues and barbecue events was over, this one will no doubt pull you back into the lifestyle of ribs and riffs. The 2008 Roots 'N Blues 'N BBQ Festival will launch in downtown Columbia, Missouri at 5:00 p.m. on three stages and on the grills of the various backyard chefs who are coming to claim the title of Kansas City Barbeque Society State Champion.

All comers to the festival will be able to hear some great tunes by the likes of Buddy Guy and Del McCoury or observe the barbecue contest over the course of Friday, October 3rd, and Saturday, October 4th. 

The gates open on 4:30 today for the 12th annual Greater Ozarks Blues Festival in downtown Springfield, MO (the address of the unnamed venue is 504 W. Sunshine, Springfield MO 65807). 

This year will feature a local favorite, the ABS Band, along with several national-level heavy hitters during each of the festival's two days.

A city that needs a big break from the slow and painful legal drama surrounding its mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, Detroit is about to get one when its four-day heavy-hitting jazz festival starts off at 5:15 p.m., with the Duke Ellington School of Performance Arts Jazz Ensemble taking one of its six stages.

The Detroit Jazz Festival, almost into its fourth decade (this year witnesses the 29th annual edition), is filled to the brim with performers forming complete spectrums of both visibility in the local, regional and national jazz scenes as well as the various denominations of jazz.  Read more »

Producer cites pinch to local economy and critical mass of fall events in the local area as reasons for abandoning the Columbus Jazz and Blues Festival's September dates and postponing the event until Spring 2009.

Citing the continuing recession that faces both the entire U.S. economy as well as that of the host city, the chief organizer of the Columbus Jazz and Blues Festival has announced that the event will be postponed until the spring of 2009.

The event, which was to take place at Riverside Park in Columbus, Mississippi, would have had its second annual fall run had it proceeded as planned, initially being scheduled for September 26th and 27th. The first edition of the festival was considered by most involved to be a definite success, and the Columbus Convention and Visitors' Bureau had set aside $7,500 for this year's Jazz and Blues Festival, with half of that already given to the festival's organizers. Since the announcement of the postponement, the Bureau has requested that this first installment of its grant be paid back, and the organizer has stated that he will comply with the Bureau's request and conditions.

With a very small amount of fans expected to show up even in a best-case scenario and a trend of belt-tightening appearing among individual as well as corporate donors throughout this summer, both the executive board of the Foundation that acts as the festival's own private bank and the organizers' advisory committee decided that giving the final green-light to the festival's September dates would create a responsibility for them that would by prohibitively irresponsible from a social standpoint.  Read more »

When Mayor Ray Nagin, the mayor of the City of New Orleans, stepped up to the podium for a hastily-fashioned press conference three days after Hurricane Katrina's passage through the city, he said that the city was, "In a state of devastation." 

Being one of the five deadliest storms in America's history, the substance of the Mayor's statement goes without saying, and the economic damage (the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the storm would slow the growth of inflation-adjusted U.S. GDP by up to 1.5%, or keep the country from about $161 billion of purchasing power; according to a later report). It was also estimated by an agency with a similar level of authority, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), that more than 20% of New Orleans' citizenry at the time-- up to 105,300 people at one point-- was left officially unemployed by the storm.

While few are fundamentally unaware of the high cost to both the nation and the city as a result of Katrina, few are also aware of exactly why so many residents lost their jobs and why the economy of New Orleans in particular was so susceptible to the storm's damage.

   Read more »