VANCOUVER MICROBLUES FESTIVAL
Photo by Kurt Johnson
By: Kurt Johnson
This writer has seen Pinetop Perkins and Leon Blue play boogie blues
piano, but never, ever seen anyone play a blues keyboard like Honey
Piazza did at The Vancouver Microblues Festival at Esther Short Park.
With a five-minute piano solo performance during the legendary Rod
Piazza and The Mighty Flyers headline set, Honey captivated listeners
and took the show by storm!
At downtown Vancouver's Esther Short Park on June 18, the festival
featured a beautiful sunny afternoon and evening showcasing top blues
acts from Portland, Seattle and Los Angeles. With outstanding performances
by Pacific Northwest blues greats such as Duffy Bishop, The Randy Oxford
Band and Portland harpmaster Bill Rhoades, it was a great way to spend
a Saturday afternoon. Sponsored by the Cascade Blues Association, the
show was one of the many showcase events around Portland and Vancouver
spotlighting top blues talent.
With Bill Rhoades' gritty blues harp playing, Duffy Bishop's wild and
entertaining singing and theatrical blues show, along with Randy Oxford's
funky trombone solos, topped off with The Mighty Flyers smooth, polished
west coast blues set, it was a treat not to be missed! In it's seventh
year, the Microblues Festival treats Portland and Vancouver with yet
another great festival location to provide big-time blues performances
for the area public; it's a great warm-up for The Waterfront Blues
Festival on Fourth of July weekend.
Headlining the festival was the legendary Rod Piazza and the Mighty
Flyers. One of the pioneers of the West Coast blues sound, Piazza began
his career in the ‘60s and has not stopped since. A master blues
harp player, singer and showman, Piazza has assembled an all-star lineup,
featuring his wife Honey on keyboards. A virtuoso pianist, Honey puts
on an amazing display of keyboard wizardry with boogie-woogie solos,
bringing a phat, flying sound to the show. To top it all off is her
million-dollar smile and gorgeous blonde hair. Judging by the good
time she has on stage, blondes really do have more fun!
Photo by Kurt Johnson
The Mighty Flyers and both Rod and Honey Piazza have won just about
every blues award there is. Longtime Blind Pig recording artists, the
Mighty Flyers have a long string of CDs, including their latest, The
Chosen Who, on the DeltaGroove label. They’ve won multiple
W.C. Handy awards, Including Best Band and just this year received nominations
for Best Pianist and Best Blues Harp.
In an interview conducted after the show, Rod Piazza had this to say
about the Handys and their new CD; “We’ve been nominated
15 times and we won best band for three years and harp player for one
year and we got ‘Blues Record of the Year’ on Blind Pig
Records.”
Piazza continues about the new CD with Delta Groove; “I’ve
known this cat Randy Chorkoff (CEO of Delta Groove) and I turned him
on to real blues.
And so, Randy started the label and the new CD is
in record stores. It’s The Original Mighty Flyers with Kid Ramos
sitting in, Honey and myself and Finis Tasby and James Gadsen on drums
with
Buddy Guy’s
brother Phil on guitar and Woody Woodson on horns, and four women backing
vocals. It was all filmed and is included on a DVD where that’s
the first time it’s ever been done. It has a Jimmy Reed number
and one of Randy’s tunes and a Gene Allison number-a gospel number
You Can Make It If You Try. There’s a Jimmy Reed and
Jimmy Rodgers, and Ike Turner number, She Made My Blood Run Cold.”
Piazza mentions this about his creative process; “I just mess
around with the harp and find a groove and find some words to fit it.
I then explain it to the cats and they follow along to it.”
With that smooth and polished West Coast groove, mixed with a Chicago
blues beat, Rod Piazza and the Mighty Flyers took the Vancouver Microblues
Festival by storm. Add in Honey Piazza’s keyboard fireworks and
all the stellar performances by each of the bands that appeared and
you had the makings of a quite a show! You can see more of Rod Piazza
and the Mighty Flyers at their website, www.themightyflyers.com. You
can see photos of the recording session at www.deltagroove.com.
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