There was a full house at RJ's Grill & Bar in downtown Pine Bluff for the kickoff of a third year of the Blues by Budweiser Concert Series.
Chad Marshall Band played original songs from their latest recording, "Born to Suffer," in its entirety.
Master of Ceremonies Dave Sadler introduced the new season of the monthly musical.
"We're glad the concert series is back and very thankful to MK Distributors for their continued support," Sadler said. "We have 12 great acts coming over the next 12 months."
Roscoe Willis, Port City Blues Society president and bass player for the Chad Marshall Band, echoed Sadler's sentiments.
"We're happy to be back," Willis said. "We get to bring a lot of great music to Pine Bluff. At the moment Blues by Budweiser is one of only two monthly musical events in downtown," he said referring also to Live@5 concerts sponsored by the Arts & Science Center for Southeast Arkansas.
"Port City Blues Society is in its seventh year and steadily growing in memberships and donations," Willis said.
Marshall shared about his bands new CD and trip to Memphis for the International Blues Challenge held in January.
"The record was recorded at Butch Scaife's Spiraling Media Studio in Bryant. Butch is an excellent engineer and a great producer. We had a lot of fun and he taught me a lot about recording. I plan to record with him some more," Marshall said.
The new release contains 12 original numbers all composed by Marshall. The group has already begun initial work on their next CD.
Marshall remarked on their part in the 2024 IBC competition at Memphis where more than 200 bands were featured.
"We met some fantastic people, heard some great bands, made some strong connections and had fun. We met folks from Canada and Iowa that we will be doing gigs for this coming year and made some industry connections that should bear fruit as well," he said.
However, there was a down side to their time on Beale Street due to the arctic blast that hit the same week.
"We stayed in a hotel with no heat and no water because the pipes froze in the frigid temps," he said.
At the RJ's event, held earlier this month, Marshall launched the first set at 8 p.m.
The backbone of the three piece group includes a rhythm section with Carl Bass on drums and Roscoe Willis on bass. Panama native "Naz" Nazarinko also joined the group on stage adding harmonica to the mix.
"There are a lot of blues harp players out there, some good, some not so much. Naz is one of the great ones. We haven't played together for almost seven years but tonight we're going to catch up," Marshall said as he introduced "Naz."
Marshall's guitar work ranged from stellar syncopation to monumental Mississippi finger stylings.
Marshall began his musical career with the St. Thomas Band as a left handed guitar player. Due to nerve damage from a woodshop accident with a table saw, he could no longer fret the strings with his right hand.
"People told me I'd never play again. I said hide and watch," he said.
Following his incident, he switched to a right handed instrument. "I had to entirely relearn guitar basically playing backwards. I could fret left handed but still couldn't hold a guitar pick in my right hand."
He went on to explain how he noticed a lot of the Mississippi Hill Country blues players didn't use picks, primarily because they didn't have access to such luxuries in the rural backcountry where their style developed.
"I studied their pick-less method and developed a hybrid form of my own," Marshall said.
Marshall's band manager, Jean Jester, was set up by the entrance providing Chad Marshall Band CD's, T-shirts and full-color posters.
"We're really excited about the things we have coming up," Jester said. "We're playing Lavender Farms on Lake Banoe in Glenwood April 6 in conjunction with a four day eclipse festival. We're kicking off the musical lineup for Fordyce on the Cotton Belt Festival Saturday April 27 and we're scheduled to appear in Eureka Springs on June 1 opening for John Nemeth. After that, we have a Gulf coast tour in the offing."
An hour in, the group took a short break to sign CD's for fans before heading up the second stanza of their program with another list of original numbers, including, "Tryin' to Get Along," "On My Mind," "Tracy," "Zero," "Anything You Do" and "Meat Box Special."
The remaining schedule for the Blues by Budweiser Concert Series includes:
April 6: Duwayne Burnside.
May 4: Tina Cossey Band.
June 1: Kent Burnside Band.
July 6: Ghost Town Blues Band.
Aug. 3: Amanda Fish.
Sept. 7: Garry Burnside.
Oct. 5: Dirty Red and the Soul Shakers.
Nov. 2: Jerry McCoy and the Groove Diggers.
Dec. 7: Fonky Donkey.
Jan. 4, 2025: Trey Johnson and Jason Willmon.
Feb. 1: Charlotte Taylor and Gypsy Rain.
Details: [email protected].