The Great British Rhythm and Blues Festival

I have some decisions to make over the next few months about where and who I sketch at The Great British Rhythm and Blues Festival in Colne, Lancashire. Clearly September onwards is going to be a busy time in the studio where I’ll be trying to express the live music performances of such a varied and talented bunch through my painting and printmaking. I have painted some of the acts previously including King King, Joanne Shaw Taylor, Aynsley Lister, Julian Burdock and Paddy Maguire but there are plenty I haven’t painted…I cannot wait! Here’s a link to the Festival’s website…. http://www.bluesfestival.co.uk/festival-Info/artist-in-residence/

25th August 2017: Here are my sketchbook pages (in no particular order) from Friday’s event at Pendle Hippodrome where Tom Attah & The Bad Man Clan opened the evening, followed by The Lachy Doley Group and the evening was brought to a close by Ian Siegal with his band. I took over 250 photographs, I committed all sorts of visual and emotional material to memory and I produced the following sketches….I have not yet scrutinised all the material but I’m hopeful that there will be at least one studio painting from 25th!

26th August 2017: Lots of sketching done, over 350 photographs taken, my head full of ideas and memories and my heart full of soul! I have so much to consider when I return to the studio…its going to take a long time before I exhaust the material from this Art Residency! Working in semi-darkness and the inherent challenges of sketching people who are constantly moving in ever changing lighting conditions here are the pages from my sketchbook from Saturday’s excellent variety of musical talent.

27th August 2017: Well, what a day! There’s so much to say but much of it will have to save for another day. I filled a further 23 pages of a sketchbook….visiting The Muni, Pendle Hippodrome and The Duke of Lancaster public house. A huge thank you to the many people who made the Colne Blues Festival such a remarkable experience and a huge apology to all the acts that I failed to see. For now I’ll let the sketches from Sunday do my talking: