 With the release of her debut US album, ‘Lucky 13’ Aussie blues woman Fiona Boyes has come full circle. Nominated for ‘Contemporary Blues Album of the Year’ in the 2007 Blues Music Awards, the world’s premier Blues awards, Fiona is the first Australian blues artist to be so honored. Described by noted critic, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Grammy Awards adviser Jeff Tamarkin as, ‘one of the most sizzling blues albums - by anyone - in years’ ‘Lucky 13’ has propelled Fiona Boyes into the international spotlight. And now, Fiona has followed up in 2008 with her 2nd nomination as ‘Contemporary Female Blues Artist of the Year’.
Not surprisingly some critics consider Fiona a musical anomaly: a fair haired, hard pickin’, down-home blueswoman who just happens to have lived all her life Down Under in Australia, light years from the Mississippi Delta or Chicago’s South Side. As one critic observed, Fiona understands blues music as deeply as if she had been raised on Dockery’s Plantation. When Fiona performed for legendary bluesman Pinetop Perkins at his induction into the Blues Hall of Fame, he said ‘I ain’t heard a woman finger-pick a guitar like that since Memphis Minnie … she’s the best gal guitar player I’ve heard in more than 35 years’ . |
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As a multiple winner of every major performance and recording award in the Australian blues scene, Fiona arrived in January 2003 on Beale Street in Memphis, an epicenter of American blues. Representing Melbourne Blues Appreciation Society, she competed against the best emerging blues talent from around the world in the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge, the world’s premier showcase for emerging blues talent. And she won.
Fiona became the first Australian and the first woman ever to win this prestigious event. She returned to the U.S. in May that same year to showcase at the W. C. Handy Awards, the Blues Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, the Chicago Blues Festival, New York Rhythm and Blues Festival, and Portland’s Waterfront Blues Festival. Fiona has since teamed up with artists such as Hubert Sumlin, who toured Australia with Fiona and her band the Fortune Tellers, Steady Rollin’ Bob Margolin, who appears on her last 2 albums and has also toured Australia with her, Kaz Kazanoff, and Alvin ‘Youngblood’ Hart. In 2005 she was guest artist on the Legendary Rhythm and Blues Cruise, playing electric guitar nightly as well as showcasing her skills as an acoustic blues fingerpicker. |
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Fiona’s achievements quickly brought her to the attention of record labels, bookers, and agents in the US. After careful consideration and reflection she signed with Memphis label, Yellow Dog Records. Fiona went into the studio in Austin,TX early in ‘06, along with friends and guests Bob Margolin, Marcia Ball, the Texas Horns, and Joel Guzman, along with Derek O’Brien, Larry Fulcher, and Frosty Smith, and recorded ‘Lucky 13’. With Kaz Kazanoff producing and Stuart Sullivan at the desk she recorded 10 originals and 3 classic covers. The album was released in July and it has received rave reviews, ranking on top of major blues charts, including #1 on XM Satellite radio, and now has earned Fiona a 2007 Blues Music Award nomination for Best Contemporary Blues Album. So, with these growing opportunities Fiona and her husband Steve have relocated to Portland from their home in Melbourne, Australia.
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Recently Fiona was staying with Hubert Sumlin at his home in Wisconsin. Since Hubert toured with Fiona in Australia they have become great friends and musical collaborators. Fiona was jamming with Hubert in his basement when Hubert said ‘Let me show you a riff that Wolf taught me. He learned it from Charley Patton.’ It's this sense of history and continuity that is really what ‘Lucky 13’ expresses, and what Fiona Boyes seeks to embrace as a musician and songwriter. It's the sense of history, the hours spent studying the past so as to nuance the classic forms in the present, the opportunity and privilege to play and learn from the living legends. As Fiona herself says, ‘As an album, Lucky 13 is diverse, but I think the material stands together as a kind of wonderful American musical road trip incorporating some of the traditions and roots that I love and deeply admire. Hope I get a chance to play some of this stuff somewhere near you soon!’
EPK at  sonicbids.com/fionaboyes |
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* See also Career and Performance highlights
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Instrumentation Solo Band - The Fortune Tellers Acoustic trio - Boyes, Brill, DelGrosso |
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