The Blues Foundation, based in Memphis, has announced the nominees for the organization's 31st annual Blues Music Awards, confirming the awards show for Thursday, May 6th, 2010 at the Cook Convention Center in Memphis. The annual event is a real blow-out, typically running better than seven hours and featuring performances by the various nominees.
Considering that 2009 saw a wealth of blues music released by some of the younger talents of the genre, it's no surprise that the nominations are dominated by artists like Joe Louis Walker, Duke Robillard, Ronnie Earl, and Tommy Castro. After spending better than a decade in the trenches, guitarist Derek Trucks finally got a little love from The Blues Foundation with two nominations, and blues legend Louisiana Red received two nominations for two different musical nominations. See who else was nominated this year....
There have been a lot of musical siblings through the years and some of them immediately come to mind, but it's difficult to imagine a group of brothers and sisters quite like the Dinnings. Over a period of several decades, they covered just about every aspect of music; including songwriting, bandleading, recording, and performing on stage and screen. And those doing the performing included a popular all-girl singing group, and a young crooner who thrilled teens with a chart-topping hit that was banned in Great Britain. (And if that wasn't enough, the family's next generation included a member of a popular modern rock group -- but more later about that.) Of course, there were nine Dinning siblings so that gave them a leg up but it's still a fascinating story, one that began with a musical childhood in Oklahoma encouraged by their father, the musical director of a
