Big Muddy Blues Festival

Time for the first of many announcements to come about this year’s Big Muddy Blues Festival. As a quick reminder, the 2011 edition will — as it has for every year prior — take place Labor Day weekend (Saturday, September 3 and Sunday, September 4) from noon to 11:00pm each day on the historic Laclede’s Landing riverfront district in downtown St. Louis.

Now with that out of the way, let’s get to the announcement:

Image pulled from www.hohnerusa.com

As you’ve probably guessed from the title already, this year’s festival main stage will play host to Kim Wilson and his Blues All Stars! Kim, a skilled harmonica player with an unmistakable stage presence and bellowing, boisterous voice, is best known for his many years with The Fabulous Thunderbirds. We all know the Thunderbirds, and if you don’t , you definitely know some of their songs — “Tuff Enough,” “Wrap It Up,” “Powerful Stuff,” among others.

While still playing and singing the songs that were hit singles for the Thunderbirds, Kim continues to embrace his Blues roots as a solo act using the skills he learned and earned playing with some of the “Who’s Who’s” of Blues music — Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy and Big Walter Horton, to name a few. When Kim and his band take the stage this Labor Day weekend, you can be sure you’ll hear some old-fashioned rhythm and blues and some wicked harmonica solos.

The full schedule (and some of the performers) are still being finalized, so keep checking in and re-posting to friends and family to see when and where Kim and the other great 2011 Big Muddy Blues Festival performers will be playing.

95 degree days are back in St. Louis, and you know what that means, don’t you? Only three more months of hot, humid 95 degree days! The Big Muddy Blues Festival Blog is back, blues lovers (with a slightly shorter URL), so refresh your bookmarks and fire away with any questions or comments you may have.

Thanks to your support, the 2010 Big Muddy Blues Festival was the most successful ever, with an estimated attendance exceeding 60,000 and a Sunday crowd that almost matched that of Saturday! We’re counting on all the hardcore Blues fans — of which we have many — here and in the region to turn out  en masse to make that happen again.

Well, it’s good to be back and we’re very excited to put together yet another Big Muddy Blues Festival. Keep checking in as we break out some big announcements over the next couple of months about this year’s festival and the performers you’ll get to see.

Starting….now!

Double-click for a full-size map.

 With 30 Blues, Soul and R&B musicians playing over two days, two stages is better than one. At Big Muddy Blues Festival, we know that three stages are even better! Check out the map above for this year’s stage locations. The Anheuser Busch main stage (Location B) is at 700 N. First Street at the base of the “grassy knoll.” This is where you can go to see Booker T, Moreland & Arbuckle and all the best national performers. ‘Location A’ is at Second & Lucas  and ‘Location C’ is located at 2nd and Morgan. These two satellite stages will feature local and regional Blues musicians.

With all three stages going at once, music fans have a lot of options on where to go and who to listen to at Big Muddy Blues Festival. Check the full schedule in our ‘About’ section and plan on visiting all three stages!

Every year , we meet people at Laclede’s Landing who have traveled from all over the country (and other continents!) for Big Muddy Blues Festival. Check your odometers, Mapquest the distance and answer our newest Big Muddy poll question: