News

Blues Trifecta coming to UA-PTC Sept. 21

UA-PTC will present Blues Trifecta, an evening of American roots and blues music, film and history on Sept. 21 featuring a screening of the award-winning documentary Two Trains Runnin', a performance by legendary blues artist Jimmy “Duck” Holmes; and a presentation by legendary blues promoter and photographer Dick Waterman.

The event will be at 7 p.m. in The Center for Humanities and Arts (CHARTS) on the UA – Pulaski Tech Main campus. Tickets are priced at $25 for reserved seats and $50 for VIP tickets which include premium reserved seating and access to the “Blues and BBQ” VIP Room sponsored by Whole Hog Café.

Dick Waterman, featured in Two Trains Runnin’, will begin the evening by taking the audience on an up-close-and-personal journey through the blues as he experienced it first-hand. He will share a selection of his rare photos and stories of these blues legends as he photographed them along the way. Waterman is best known as the legendary blues promoter and photographer credited with rediscovering Son House and Skip James in Mississippi. He managed Son House, Skip James, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Junior Wells, Arthur Crudup, and he started the career of Bonnie Raitt as he persuaded her to perform, opening up for these blues legends. In 2000, he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame as one of the first non-performers to be honored.

Performing second, Jimmy “Duck” Holmes, 70, of Bentonia, Miss., is one of the most celebrated rural blues musicians performing today and is one of the last of the Bentonia blues stylists made famous by Skip James and Jack Owens. He is the proprietor of the Blues Front Café, the oldest operating juke joint in Mississippi.

To complete the Blues Trifecta evening, Two Trains Runnin’, an 80-minute award-winning documentary by Avalon Films and Freedom Road Productions, follows the true story of the search for two forgotten blues singers in Mississippi during the height of the civil rights movement. The film is directed by acclaimed filmmaker Sam Pollard and narrated by Common.