What we do
- Working with other community music groups and venues, we promote shows by blues artists.
- Post on our website a calendar of upcoming area blues events and a list of links to blues-based music acts and other live music.
- Sponsor hands-on workshops for all ages in blues history, playing instruments, singing and songwriting. We plan to bring blues programs to community venues such as afterschool youth centers and schools, with special focus on the African-American community.
- Encourage research, performance and publication of the history of African-American music in West Virginia.
Mining our Blues history
The Charleston WV Blues Society has also taken on the goal of unearthing the rich, buried treasure of African-American music in the Mountain State. During the early 20th century, many African Americans moved here to work in the salt mines, railroads (remember John Henry?) and coal mines. There were famous songwriters and entertainers from our state, including Bill Withers and Bobby Womack. There were solo blues guitarist singers; jazz and r&b musicians who played with traveling bands; and black cabaret divas. There were juke joints and fancy clubs in the African-American community, alive but now vanished. Please contact us if you have some of this history in your family or community group. We can post a paragraph about it here and have a link another website or blog.
Why joing the Blues Society?
- Hear some of the coolest music in the world.
- Make new friends who also love the coolest music in the world.
- Support the musicians and venues who put the coolest music in the world on stage.
- Pass all this cool music on to other folk young and old!