mamaroux
07-24-2008, 08:27 PM
PITTSBURGH BLUES FESTIVAL
When: Friday-Sunday
Where: Hartwood Acres, Hampton
Cost: Friday: free with grocery bag of food donation. Saturday and Sunday: $22 in advance; $25 at the gate
Details: 412-460-2583.
In Tab Benoit's home state of Louisiana, music is more than a diversion -- it's a way of life.
"You go to a house party or a wedding, and they break out the instruments," he says in advance of his appearance Friday at the Pittsburgh Blues Festival. "Everybody seems to play."
And so did Benoit, who picked up the guitar as a teenager, never thinking he would earn a cent from doing something he loved. He went to school, became a pilot and was making a good wage flying for oil companies in Louisiana. Music was merely an avocation, but when more and more people began to ask him to play, there was a decision to make.
"It was hard to walk away from (being a pilot) and make music my total living," he says. "But when I did it, I was sure. It was like jumping off the edge of a cliff knowing that the parachute was going to open, not hoping it would."
Benoit's certainty came not only from a sense that he could make a decent wage, but the inherent belief he had something to offer musically. His faith has been borne out over the past two decades, and was affirmed last year when he was named Contemporary Blues Artist of the Year at the Blues Music Awards.
Benoit's sound seems too diverse for one category. He is equally comfortable playing variations of jazz, country, R&B and, of course, the Cajun sound of his home state.
Listen closely, however, and the source is the same.
"All of the stuff I'm doing is rooted in the blues, and fans of blues can get into what I'm doing," Benoit says. "That's how it ends up there. The music scene has so many categories now, and all of them change. Look at what they call R&B now compared to what it was when it started. Usher and Mariah Carey are R&B. That's not Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin; it's not even close. But blues when it started, it's still the blues today."
Louisiana -- specifically New Orleans -- is the hub, the wheelhouse, the cultural heart of America, Benoit insists. It is where race, religion and class standing have less a sway than almost anywhere else, where opportunity abounds for those with talent, energy or ambition. Even post-Katrina, he says, this remains true.
"It's been like that for eons, and the music that comes from there has influences from Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, Spain, Native American, you name it," Benoit says. "It's a blend of everything, and it's good. Mostly, there are only rhythmic differences."
Tab Benoit follows Sweat Betty Blues Band, Blue Lunch, and Little Brian and the Zydeco Travelers on Friday night. The show runs 4-10:15 p.m. at Hartwood Acres. Free admission Friday with donation of bag of groceries. 412-460-2583.
-- Regis Behe
When: Friday-Sunday
Where: Hartwood Acres, Hampton
Cost: Friday: free with grocery bag of food donation. Saturday and Sunday: $22 in advance; $25 at the gate
Details: 412-460-2583.
In Tab Benoit's home state of Louisiana, music is more than a diversion -- it's a way of life.
"You go to a house party or a wedding, and they break out the instruments," he says in advance of his appearance Friday at the Pittsburgh Blues Festival. "Everybody seems to play."
And so did Benoit, who picked up the guitar as a teenager, never thinking he would earn a cent from doing something he loved. He went to school, became a pilot and was making a good wage flying for oil companies in Louisiana. Music was merely an avocation, but when more and more people began to ask him to play, there was a decision to make.
"It was hard to walk away from (being a pilot) and make music my total living," he says. "But when I did it, I was sure. It was like jumping off the edge of a cliff knowing that the parachute was going to open, not hoping it would."
Benoit's certainty came not only from a sense that he could make a decent wage, but the inherent belief he had something to offer musically. His faith has been borne out over the past two decades, and was affirmed last year when he was named Contemporary Blues Artist of the Year at the Blues Music Awards.
Benoit's sound seems too diverse for one category. He is equally comfortable playing variations of jazz, country, R&B and, of course, the Cajun sound of his home state.
Listen closely, however, and the source is the same.
"All of the stuff I'm doing is rooted in the blues, and fans of blues can get into what I'm doing," Benoit says. "That's how it ends up there. The music scene has so many categories now, and all of them change. Look at what they call R&B now compared to what it was when it started. Usher and Mariah Carey are R&B. That's not Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin; it's not even close. But blues when it started, it's still the blues today."
Louisiana -- specifically New Orleans -- is the hub, the wheelhouse, the cultural heart of America, Benoit insists. It is where race, religion and class standing have less a sway than almost anywhere else, where opportunity abounds for those with talent, energy or ambition. Even post-Katrina, he says, this remains true.
"It's been like that for eons, and the music that comes from there has influences from Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, Spain, Native American, you name it," Benoit says. "It's a blend of everything, and it's good. Mostly, there are only rhythmic differences."
Tab Benoit follows Sweat Betty Blues Band, Blue Lunch, and Little Brian and the Zydeco Travelers on Friday night. The show runs 4-10:15 p.m. at Hartwood Acres. Free admission Friday with donation of bag of groceries. 412-460-2583.
-- Regis Behe