Mr. Neal Returns to Washington

I doubt anyone at Surf Club Live outside D.C. was thinking of the debt ceiling last Thursday when the D.C. Blues Society brought bluesman Kenny Neal back for an encore performance. Neal, who played Surf Club Live last August, played to a full house. In between sets, he talked to Beldon's Blues Point about, among other things, his latest album "Hooked on Your Love" and that little trick he does where he simultaneously plays guitar and harmonica:



In the audience was bluesman Memphis Gold who lives in the D.C. area and who in June debuted at the Chicago Blues Festival, one of the most popular festivals in the world. Memphis also talked about a series of benefit shows he and Neal are planning for Jim O'Neal,founder of Memphis' current label, Stackhouse Records. A noted blues historian, he also co-founded Living Blues magazine. Memphis said O'Neal has cancer:



Memphis told me after this interview that he and Neal will perform at Buddy Guy's Legends in Chicago in October.

I managed to record three songs before my I-phone ran out of juice. This one is a jam!



If you follow this next one to the end, you will be as surprised as Kenny was when a female fan showed her appreciation by hanging her--well, you'll see--across his guitar neck...



And this last one gave us a preview of what we'll see at Buddy Guy's this October:



Hope you all got a sense from those videos as to how much fun that show was. Don't forget to keep sending those songs to beldonsbluespoint@yahoo.com. We are preparing to feature stuff from readers in an upcoming post.