Before you think I am going to write about some heavy crossroad I have faced in my life, you’re wrong.   The “Crossroads” I want to tell you about was this amazing two-day music event featuring the top blues guitarists in the world that I had the pleasure of seeing on Saturday night at MSG.

For some reason music and art trends and tastes constantly evolve.  Having said that, the best music and art of any era tends to stand the test of time.  There has been a lot written about “the blues” and its influence on the music of today.  The most compelling thought to me is that blues are an American art form…in fact the first pure art form that we wound up exporting to the rest of the world.  Ask Eric Clapton and Keith Richards (and the Beatles)…they heard American Blues and built on top of it.

What’s also interesting is that the blues shifted from acoustic to electric after WWII.  This window of time is really significant…almost everything culturally important started to come out of America.  Our first music heros were defining the world’s musical tastes and as it turned out, abstract artists working in NY like Jackson Pollock were changing the world’s perspective on visual art as well.

My love for music is rooted in the blues.  Jeff Beck is the greatest guitarist ever known!  The Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin were the greatest blues-rock bands and the blues to me continues to feel like a special American art form.  Sorry BB, the thrill ain’t gone yet.

Monday, April 15, 2013