Caffè Lena - Blues Festival, March 2008


Mark Tolstrup	Beaucoup Blue	Thomasina Winslow

3rd Annual Blues Fest
Saturday, March 22 • 8 PM
$15/14

Mark Tolstrup

For the third year running Caffè Lena sets aside a full day to celebrate one of its most popular styles of music, acoustic blues.
In a room that has hosted some of the genre’s best known players, including Mississippi John Hurt, Skip James, Honeyboy Edwards, Dave Van Ronk and John Hammond, blues fans will get a chance to participate in workshops and hear new and old blues songs in a ‘round-robin’ style concert.

The festival’s featured performers are:

Thomasina Winslow

Mark Tolstrup
marktolstrup.com
Mark specializes in bottleneck Delta blues and sings both classics and new blues songs with a powerful, soulful voice. He has sold out many concerts at Caffè Lena and now tours regularly along the east coast.

Thomasina Winslow
www.thomasinawinslow.com
Thomasina spent her childhood performing and touring with her father, renowned bluesman Tom Winslow. Now a mature talent in her own right, Thomasina blends classics with her own deep originals.

Beaucoup Blue
www.beaucoupblue.com
This Philadelphia father-and-son duo offer arrestingly soulful songs based in blues tradition. They play a handsome range of instruments and blend voices like only family members can.

Beaucoup Blue

Workshops

1 to 5 PM

$25 each, or $60 for all three

1 to 2 PM
Thomasina Winslow's Workshop:
Right-Hand Technique for Fingerstyle Blues

Beginning and intermediate students are encouraged to bring their guitars for this workshop. The first half will cover the thumb technique of alternating bass. The second half will be about building independence between the thumb and fingers using both the Rev. Gary Davis style two-finger technique, and the Mississippi John Hurt style three finger technique. Finally, Thomasina will demonstrate with music examples and if there is time left show how the classical technique can be helpful.

2:30 to 3:30 PM
Beaucoup Blue's Workshop:
"Slide guitar techniques for Ensemble Playing"

David and Adrian Mowry will demonstrate how they express traditional and contemporary blues and other roots ensemble composition through the limitations of open tuning and the bottleneck (or in their case the brass slide). They will also address physical strategies for using the bottleneck or slide in various manners.

4 to 5 PM
Mark Tolstrup's Workshop:
"78 RPM Blues Records"

Early Delta and country blues was first captured and recorded on 78rpm records in the 1930's. Mark Tolstrup picked up an old crank Victrola and started collecting vintage blues and jazz records.
In this workshop students will be looking at and listening to original 1930's 78rpm records by artists including Blind Lemon Jefferson, Tampa Red, Blind Willie Johnson, Blind Blake, Peetie Wheatstraw and Gus Cannon. We will discuss some of the major labels that first recorded the blues, such as Paramount, Vocalion and Columbia. We will also talk about some tips for starting a record collection of your own.

Photo: Mark Tolstrup	Photo: Beaucoup Blue	Photo: Thomasina Winslow
© 2007, Joseph Deuel	© 2007, Joseph Deuel	© 2007, Joseph Deuel