SAN ANGELO, TX — The 2018 Simply Blues Festival is set to start Saturday, May 19, on S. Oakes St. in downtown San Angelo. According to the schedule, there are 11 contenders for the 2019 crown. The winner of the Fest, as determined by a pool of three selected judges from San Antonio, Dallas, and Midland, gets $2,000 to pay for their trip to the 2019 International Blues Challenge in Memphis, Tennessee on January 22-26.
San Angelo musician T. Gozney Thornton said the International Blues Festival would have the top blues act chosen in San Angelo’s Fest Saturday competing with musicians from all over the world. Thornton won the festival a few years ago and participated in the competition. Today, he sits on the San Angelo Blues Society Board of Directors. Tomorrow’s blues festival is their signature event held annually.
The festival generates revenue from entry fees, vendors, and sponsors to fund scholarships for accomplished area musicians. Last year, nine area high school students went to college funded in part by a Blues Society scholarship.
Saturday’s festival will be the 10th annual for an event that began almost as a whim of Rod Bridgman, the founder of the former Sealy Flats blues bar on S. Oakes St. Bridgeman sold the joint and retired to Florida in 2015, but his vision lives on. Today, where the Sealy Flats “café,” as Bridgman called it, once was is now an upscale restaurant called Knosh.
Like in past years, the festival is a street party. Oakes St. will be closed off from Harris Ave. to Concho Ave. The stage will be located near Concho Ave. on the south end. The event is BYOB. If you stay for long, bring lawn chairs and a cooler. Each year, as many as 10,000 spectators take in the event.
Saturday’s contest is divided into four sets and each set features not just full bands, but one solo or duo act each. The first set begins at 11:55 a.m. Thornton said each set has very talented musicians. “We reviewed each entry and heard their audition tape,” Thornton said. So, if you want to see the best parts of the show, you’ll need to see the entire event.
The nighttime finale, the fourth set will start off with the winner of the festival. Then four professional acts will conclude the event, kicking off with Thornton’s Chivos Blue band, followed by Michael Milligan and the Texiana Bluez, and the headliner, John Nemeth and the Blue Dreamers.
| Time | Event |
|---|---|
| 11:30 a.m. | Welcome (Clay Hubbard), Blessing (Pastor Russ Frazier), Prayer (Pastor Russ Frazier), Pledge of Allegiance (Clay Hubbard), National Anthem (Manny Campos), Rib Cook-Off |
| Introduction of Judges | |
| 11:55 – 12:15 | JUST THURSDAY BAND |
| 12:20 – 12:40 | DRAWING A BLANK BAND |
| 12:45 – 1:05 | RANDALL STEPHENS & MATT LOPEZ DUO |
| 1:10 – 1:30 | TRADING COMPANY BAND |
| 1:30 – 2:20 | Judges Break and |
| Performance by the Darren Morrison Band | |
| 2:25 – 2:45 | HEAVY RICHARD BAND |
| 2:50 – 3:10 | T. R. HENDRICKSON SOLO |
| 3:15 - 3:35 | JONATHON MATTHEWS AND THE EXPERIMENT BAND |
| 3:35 – 3:55 | Judges Break Introduction of Scholarship Recipients and Sponsor Photographs |
| 3:55 – 4:15 | PEACE OF BLUES BAND |
| 4:20 – 4:40 | BOOGIE TOWN BAND |
| 4:45 – 5:05 | THE BLUESMEN DUO |
| 5:10 – 5:30 | KT AND THE BLUES SCIENTISTS BAND |
| 5:30 – 5:50 | Winners of Car Show and Cook-Off |
| Thanks to Judges and Introduction of Winners in Band and Solo/Duo categories. | |
| 5:50 – 6:15 | BAND WINNER |
| 6:30 – 7:30 | T GOZNEY THORNTON AND CHIVOS BLUE |
| 7:45 - 9:15 | MICHAEL MILLIGAN AND TEXIANA BLUEZ |
| 9:30 – 11:00 | JOHN NEMETH AND THE BLUE DREAMERS |
The green room for the performers will be the secret speakeasy basement bar underneath the Cactus Hotel. The speakeasy was designed into the 1928 hotel during prohibition. Prohibition ended on December 5, 1933. For years, the former secret bar was a storage room. It’s been remodeled and fixed up as a meeting room recently.
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