1. "LIVE" BLUES THIS WEEK (and beyond)...

Our "Live Music" page has been updated. Support the Delta's best blues
musicians and clubs:
http://www.cathead.biz/livemusic.html

2. BUD SPIRES AND DUCK HOLMES TO PLAY...

Per Larry Morrisey in Jackson: Harmonica player Bud Spires from Bentonia (played with Jack Owens) is going to be playing with Jimmy "Duck" Holmes at Martin's Lounge in Jackson, Saturday, July 26th. Start time TBD, probably somewhere between 10 & 11.

3. DOROTHY MOORE CD RELEASE PARTY...

Per Dorothy's manager Marcia Weaver:
Dorothy Moore's CD release party will be July 27, 4-7 p.m. at Peaches Cafe on Farish Street. Dorothy Moore Gittin' Down Live! features Moore singing nine of her classics on tour including Misty Blue. Extra songs are four never recorded by Moore. Gittin' Down Live CD cover is from Peaches Cafe next door to the Alamo Theater where Dorothy started her career. The CD is produced by Dorothy Moore on Farish Street Records of Mississippi, her label. Come to Peaches on Sunday, July 27, via Hamilton Street off Mill Street, Jackson, due to construction on Farish Street. Cash bar available. No cover.

4. NEW AT CAT HEAD DELTA BLUES & FOLK ART...

- New art at Cat Head: Blues paintings by self-taught Memphis talent Lamar Sorrento. 4 nice pieces: Robert Johnson, Jessie Mae Hemphill, Albert King and Duane Allman. Priced between $175 and $275. (Incidentally, Lamar recently painted the backdrop used behind Bobby Rush at Ground Zero Blues Club when they shot Bobby's upcoming DVD. The club bought the piece, and it is currently on display there.) ALSO, we just received a few cool bottle cap crosses created by folk artist McArthur Chism of Water Valley, MS. Just $25 each. As always, I can email photos of anything and everything you are interested in.

- New books at Cat Head: "Waking Up In Memphis," the excellent new book by Memphis music critic Andria Lisle and British author Mike Evans. Great snap shots of southern rock and blues. Includes chapters like: "The Memphis Blues Again" and "Down In Mississippi." (The latter has interviews with the Delta Blues Museum's Mae Smith, Stackhouse Records' Nancy Kossman and yours truly with my lovely wife.) A fun and VERY informative read! Just $13.95.

- New CD arrivals at Cat Head: We now have CDs in stock by 95% of the acts performing at Clarksdale's Sunflower River Blues & Gospel Festival on August 8 & 9. Get 'em now, and get ready to see 'em "live" soon.Bring your tour group to Cat Head: Contact me before your tour group of 12+ folks comes to town, and I'll set up a little free or low-cost music in store to entertain you. Email or call to see what we can do.

5. RECENT DELTA HAPPENINGS AND INFO...

- Last Thursday, the Delta Blues Museum board members hosted a wildly successful reception at the newly restored Greyhound Bus Station (a.k.a. Visitor's Center) for the new museum director Shelley Ritter. Literally HUNDREDS of people showed up to meet her and give her their support. (Geez, no pressure.) A truly wonderful event. Welcome Shelley!

- "No Depression" contributor writers Eric and Paige visited Clarksdale from Nashville over the weekend to write an article promoting the town. They stayed at the Riverside Hotel, ate at Abe's BBQ, saw the Bluff City Backsliders at Hopson/Shack-up Inn, saw Wesley Jefferson Band at Club Junction, shopped Cat Head, shopped Dela's Stackhouse, toured the Delta Blues Museum, met John "The Riverman" Ruskey of Quapaw Canoe Company and visited Muddy's Mound. My guess is the article will be more than just a little crowded with good stuff. Real nice people. Real nice magazine.

- Tues., July 15 Po' Monkey's Lounge near Merigold, MS rocked with killer blues by Cadillac John & Bill Abel, the Delta State University Blues Band, Terry "Big T" Williams, Jay Kirgis and others. High points included Big T's electrified audience participation performance and Jay Kirgis' lights-out harmonica segue while proprietor Willie Seaberry fixed a blown fuse. The event was sponsored by the Delta Center for Culture & Learning ( www.blueshighway.org).
Special thanks to Luther Brown! Let's make this a regular thing...

6. OTHER LOCAL MUSIC/ARTS NEWS...

From Clarksdale Press Register:
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* Ritter takes reins at Blues Museum
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The Delta Blues Museum's new director assumed her official duties Monday and was on hand for the monthly meeting of the board of directors by Tuesday.
(By: Emily Le Coz - Staff Writer)
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=9517790&BRD=2038&PAG=
461&dept_id= 230617

7. ANOTHER REASON TO ATTEND CLARKSDALE FEST...

WHAT: "Honeyboy" documentary screening
WHO: Hosted by the film's director Scott Taradash
WHEN: 6pm, Thursday, August 7 (80-min.)
WHERE: Hopson Commissary
WHY: Honeyboy Edwards is playing the Sunflower River Blues & Gospel Festival OTHER: Hopson will host a happy hour starting at 5 pm that Thursday evening and have BBQ dinners available from 6-7:30pm. Then, as part of the "Juke Joint Caravan" detailed below, there will be "live" blues TBA from 8pm-midnight.

ALSO, remember that a "Juke Joint Caravan" partially subsidized by the festival association will take place that Thursday evening, starting between 8 and 9 pm. 5 area clubs/jukes will feature "live" blues bands: Hopson Commissary, Ground Zero Blues Club, Sarah's Kitchen, Jacqueline's Blues Bar and Red's. Line-up to come.

8. HOWLIN' WOLF FESTIVAL FRI., AUG. 29...

Courtesy of Richard
Ramsey: http://www.dailytimesleader.com/articles/2003/07/14/
news/news05.txt Featured acts will include Willie King and Bobby Rush. (I hear this year's poster is once again very cool!)

9. BYHALIA, MS BLUES FESTIVAL INFO...

The 5th annual Byhalia Blues Festival will be held on the second of August in at Lucas Arena in Byhalia,Mississippi. Line-up includes: Shirley Brown, Willie Clayton, Rickie Strickland, J. Blackfoot, Sheba Potts Wright, Mr. Poonanny, Quinn Golden and Queen Ann Hines. Gates 1 pm. Show 4 pm. Contact Bobby Riley at 901-406-8231 for further information.

10. 2003 KING BISCUIT BLUES FEST LINE-UP...

Main Stage - Thursday 10/9
3:00/4:00 SBBS Talent Contest Winner
4:15/5:20 IBC Winner ­ Delta Moon
5:40/6:50 Sterling Billingsley
7:10/8:25 Hash Brown & The Browntones
8:45/10:00 Travis Haddix
10:25/11:40 Sherman Robertson

Main Stage ­ Friday 10/10
12:00/1:00 John Weston
1:15/2:20 Sam Carr & The Delta Jukes
2:35/3:40 Michael Burks
4:00/5:10 The Nighthawks
5:30/6:45 Pinetop Perkins & Bob Margolin
7:05/8:20 Duke Robillard
8:45/10:00 Jay Geils, Jerry Portnoy, Darrell Nulish & David
Maxwell
10:30/11:45 Otis Rush

Main Stage ­ Saturday 10/11
12:00/1:00 Charles Walker
1:15/2:20 Smokin¹ Joe Kubek & Bnois King
2:35/3:40 Jelly Roll All-Stars
4:00/5:10 Anson Funderburgh & The Rockets featuring Sam
Myers
5:30/6:45 Robert Lockwood, Jr.
7:05/8:20 Magic Slim & The Teardrops
8:45/10:00 Otis Clay
10:30/11:45 Charlie Musselwhite

Houston Stackhouse Acoustic Stage ­ Friday 10/10
12:00/1:00 Andy Cohen
1:20/2:20 Little Pink Anderson
2:40/3:40 Precious Bryant
4:00/5:00 Drink Small

Houston Stackhouse Acoustic Stage ­ Saturday 10/11
12:00/1:00 Roy Book Binder
1:20/2:20 Michael Sweaney
2:40/3:40 Ernie Hawkins
4:00/5:00 Louisiana Red

Robert Lockwood Heritage Stage - Friday 10/10
5:30/6:35 The Fieldstones
7:00/8:05 Cedell Davis
8:30/9:40 Ray Sharpe
10:05/11:15 Johnny Nicholas

Robert Lockwood Heritage Stage - Saturday 10/11
5:30/6:35 Little Arthur Duncan & Rockin¹ Johnny
7:00/8:05 Texas Johnny Brown
8:30/9:40 Willie King & The Liberators
10:05/11:15 Chick Willis

11. FROM LUTHER BROWN AT DELTA STATE...

- Patty Mekussends this information to the group: The Willie Dixon-Vicksburg Blues Society will be hosting a Blues Challenge on October 4, 2003 during the Vicksburg Fall Festival. They are working on the prize details, but hopefully will secure a two night booking at the Ameristar Bottleneck Blues Bar for the winner of the Challenge. ContactLucilleRidges- lucille@digitalmantr.com or Patty at
pattym@vicksburg.org.

12. MUSCLE SHOALS INFO COURTESY OF BARRY BAYS & FRIENDS...

- Bad news from Muscle Shoals...the Malaco guys have decided to sell the equipment and shut the doors to Muscle Shoals Sound...the closing date is set for August 15....rumor has itthat the place can be bought for less than $600,000! Great Price!.... 30,000 square feet of building space..with two Neve vintage consoles....Studer tape machines....Tons of equipment...pictues...mics..etc... It is also waterfront property on the Tennessee River..

13. OUTSIDER ARTIST LONNIE HOLLEY...

Art fan Alice Faye Love tip us to a current installation showing of Cat Head favorite Lonnie Holley's artwork. Below is some press release info for the Birmingham Museum of Art event. If you are interested in owning a piece of Holley's work, please check out the sampling of work on our web site, or visit to see our entire selection of watercolor paintings, wire faces and sandstone sculptures. I can honestly say that in my opinion, Lonnie Holley is the most thought-provoking artist I have ever had the pleasure to spend time with.

PERSPECTIVES 8: LONNIE HOLLEY ... BIRMINGHAM MUSEUM
OF ART, JUNE 2003 - MAY 2004
The Birmingham Museum of Art (BMA) is pleased to present the sculpture of Lonnie Holley for the eighth installment of the PERSPECTIVES series. Holley, a renowned self-taught artist and native of Birmingham, will begin creating his newest works in early June, on site in the Museum's Sculpture Garden. Perspectives 8 is part of the Museum's ongoing PERSPECTIVES series of exhibitions focused on contemporary art and will be on view through May 2004. For Perspectives 8, Holley will create an outdoor sculptural environment utilizing found materials and the detritus of our industrial society. His material will include discarded computer parts, scrap metal, wire, wood, lamps and fabric, which he will reclaim and reformulate into art. Remarking on Holley's distinctive talent, Dr. David Moos, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the BMA, states: "Lonnie is classified as a self-taught artist because he received no formal training, [but his] prodigious and innate abilities as a visual artist simply make him one of the most innovative and eloquent of contemporary visual artists in Alabama." Lonnie Holley was born in Birmingham in 1950, the seventh of twenty-seven children. He persevered through a difficult life beset with poverty, depression and familial strife. It was not until 1979 that Holley discovered his penchant for art after unemployment and depression caused him to nearly take his own life. Holley began soul-searching, praying, and soon discovered a type of stone in his sister's yard, which was near a cast iron foundry. Holley believed it was divine intervention that led him to the sandstone, an industrial by-product of cast iron molds, and inspired him to create art. Holley's first work consisted primarily of gravestones, but it was not long before his home near the Birmingham Airport was overflowing with thousands of his sandstone sculptures. Holley received his first notice in 1981, when he took his work to the Birmingham Museum of Art. The director of the Museum was so impressed that he contacted a friend at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., who was organizing an exhibition of Appalachian artists. Holley was included in this exhibition, More Than Land and Sky, which traveled to 10 museums throughout the region. His work, which now includes mixed-media sculpture and painting, has been featured in numerous exhibitions. Several prominent museums also feature Lonnie's work in their permanent collections, including the Birmingham Museum of Art, the Michael C. Carlos Museum and High Museum of Art in Atlanta, and the Museum of American Folk Art in New York City.

The Perspectives series has been generously funded by Pauline Ireland.

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THANKS.