Buddy Guy
Waterfront Blues Festival
Tom McCall Waterfront Park
Portland, OR.
July 1, 2005

Recorded from KBOO FM, a local all volunteer radio station. There is some inherent reception problems scattered throughout these recordings. The station is not very powerful and the team had some problems on the first day of the festival getting everything "plugged in". All in all some great music with a few tolerable "blurps".

FM > MD > HDD > CDWav (for splitting) > FLAC

Sadly with this show there was about 60 seconds of major interference and I had to fade one song to the next. It is as complete as I could get.

No set lists or art. Hope you all enjoy the shows....twofthrs.


Buddy Guy

"By far and without doubt the greatest guitarist alive today" – Eric Clapton

Five time Grammy Award winner, Buddy Guy, the greatest living exponent of classic Chicago electric blues, kicks off the festival opening night, Friday, July 1, presented by Co-op Network. Guy's soulful singing and incendiary guitar work have earned him four Grammy Awards, 19 W.C. Handy Blues Wards, and this spring led to his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, joining such past inductees as Chuck Berry, Fats Domino, Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Cream and the Rolling Stones.

At this year's W.C. Handy Awards, the blues world's Grammy, Buddy was named Contemporary Blues Male Artist of the Year. And his recent Blues Singer release on Silvertone was selected Blues Album and Acoustic Blues Album of the Year. Blues Singer also won this year's Grammy for Best Traditional Blues Album.

Born in Lettsworth, La., George "Buddy" Guy spent time playing with "Big Poppa" John Tilley and Baton Rouge harmonica ace, Raful Neal. (Neal, who appeared at the Waterfront Blues Festival in 2000, 2001 and 2002, passed away last year. His son, guitarist Kenny Neal, as a teenager played bass in Guy's band and will appear at the festival this year with harmonica master Billy Branch).

After moving to Chicago in 1957, Buddy Guy played and recorded with such legendary Windy City bluesmen as Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson, Bo Diddley, Otis Rush and Willie Dixon. He also performed on a number of now classic recordings on Chess Records, including those he put out with the late harmonica ace, Junior Wells. Buddy's pioneering blues guitar work on those recordings influenced and was idolized by such rockers as Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Stevie Ray Vaughan.

During the '70s, Guy toured with the Rolling Stones and began a long period of collaboration with Junior Wells. (Buddy's brother Phil Guy, who was second guitar in that band, appeared at the Waterfront Blues Festival in 2003). Guy owned and ran Chicago's renowned South Side blues club, the Checkerboard Lounge, from 1972 until it closed in the early '80s. In 1989, he opened Legends, which today remains Chicago's premier blues club.