Here’s a quick quiz:
What do Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Jay McShann, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, John Hammond, the late Jimmy Witherspoon, Dr. John, Maria Muldaur, Roomful of Blues, and the Canadian band The Rockin’ Highliners all have in common?
Answer: Duke Robillard.
Every one of those names has shared recording studio space or stage time with a man who is a legend in the blues community.
In 2007 guitarist, bandleader, singer, songwriter, producer, session player, and a one-man cheering section for the blues, Duke received a Grammy nomination for his "Guitar Groove-a-rama" CD and was also honored with the prestigious Rhode Island Pell Award for "excellence in the arts" - named for Senator Claiborne Pell who help establish the the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities in 1965....
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Here’s a quick quiz:
What do Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Jay McShann, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, John Hammond, the late Jimmy Witherspoon, Dr. John, Maria Muldaur, Roomful of Blues, and the Canadian band The Rockin’ Highliners all have in common?
Answer: Duke Robillard.
Every one of those names has shared recording studio space or stage time with a man who is a legend in the blues community.
In 2007 guitarist, bandleader, singer, songwriter, producer, session player, and a one-man cheering section for the blues, Duke received a Grammy nomination for his "Guitar Groove-a-rama" CD and was also honored with the prestigious Rhode Island Pell Award for "excellence in the arts" - named for Senator Claiborne Pell who help establish the the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities in 1965.
Other awards over the last decade are numerous and global. BB King himself has called Duke "One of the great players," The Houston Post called him "one of God's guitarists. The New York Times says "Robillard is a soloist of stunning force and originality.
Duke had his first band in high school — he was born in Woonsocket, Rhode Island — and he was fascinated from the beginning by the ways in which jazz, swing, and the blues were linked. In 1967, he formed Roomful of Blues, and the band was tight enough and tough enough to accompany two of its heroes, Big Joe Turner and Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson on record and in live appearances.
Always ahead of his time, Duke’s first band pre-dated the renewed interest in jump blues by more than a decade — and almost 20 years later, in 1986, when he recorded with jazz sax master Scott Hamilton, he recorded a collection of classic big band tunes from the ’30s and ’40s, thus skillfully pre-dating the neo-Swing craze of the mid ’90s.
Roomful of Blues — which still continues, forty years later — gave Duke his first exposure to a wide public, and when he left after a dozen years, he played briefly with rockabilly king Robert Gordon, then cut two albums with the Legendary Blues Band (a sterling collection of former members of Muddy Waters’ band). He led his own band until 1990, and then replaced Jimmy Vaughan in the Fabulous Thunderbirds.
In 1993, as he was about to sign a world-wide recording deal with Virgin/Pointblank, he met Holger Petersen, head of the Canadian independent label Stony Plain, at a folk festival in Winnipeg. In conversation, he mentioned he wanted to record a complete album of blues, without the r & b and jazz influences of his work to date.
Petersen was interested; Virgin gave the go-ahead, and the resulting album, Duke’s Blues, earned rave reviews. It was so successful, in fact, that Virgin soon licensed the record from Stony Plain and released it around the world (except in Canada, where it continues in the Canadian company’s catalogue.
Roomful of Blues — which still continues, forty years later — gave Duke his first exposure to a wide public, and when he left after a dozen years, he played briefly with rockabilly king Robert Gordon, then cut two albums with the Legendary Blues Band (a sterling collection of former members of Muddy Waters’ band). He led his own band until 1990, and then replaced Jimmy Vaughan in the Fabulous Thunderbirds.
In 1993, as he was about to sign a world-wide recording deal with Virgin/Pointblank, he met Holger Petersen, head of the Canadian independent label Stony Plain, at a folk festival in Winnipeg. In conversation, he mentioned he wanted to record a complete album of blues, without the r & b and jazz influences of his work to date.
Petersen was interested; Virgin gave the go-ahead, and the resulting album, Duke’s Blues, earned rave reviews. It was so successful, in fact, that Virgin soon licensed the record from Stony Plain and released it around the world (except in Canada, where it continues in the Canadian company’s catalogue.
Duke Robillard is a man in command of a full range of creative talents — unique in the blues, and rare in the music industry. A complete artist at the height of his power.
www.dukerobillard.com
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