Ian Siegal is widely regarded as the most compelling and admired contemporary Blues artiste to have come out of Britain since the icons of the sixties. In 2016 he celebrates 25 years of touring with his band. To mark this milestone he will tour a program of songs drawn from his catalogue of album releases.
His first professional show with a band was in 1991 - a time when blues was decidedly unfashionable. Gaining a presence as a 20-year old singing the blues was not easy. Thankfully he persevered, going on to release numerous acclaimed albums and accumulating more British & European awards than you can shake a stick at (11 at the last count), together with three nominations in the USA Blues Music Awards, effectively the Grammys of the Blues. This puts him a long way ahead of his contemporaries on this side of the Atlantic. Interestingly all these awards have come in the past five years, suggesting that there’s a lot left in the tank.
“You gotta pay your dues to play the blues” and pay his dues he certainly has: from busking on the streets of Berlin as a teenager, to grueling 3-hours-a-night club residencies, to hair raising treks across eastern Europe. His cv now includes shows in 35 countries, guest appearances with some of the great names of the blues, and a live album recorded at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
To pigeon-hole Siegal as a bluesman is to underrate an exceptional and versatile talent. Blues is just one shade in the palette of an artiste who slips between continents, eras and expectations. His love of nascent rock ‘n rollers Little Richard and Elvis, blues titans such as Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf, and the experimentalism of Tom Waits, fuels a powerful voice and magnetic stage presence.
In 2014 he assembled a new band – his best ever, says Ian - and in March 2015 released a universally praised album One Night In Amsterdam, recorded in front of an audience at the North Sea Jazz Club. A retrospective collection of 36 songs written or co-written by Siegal will be released as a deluxe album edition in the autumn.
“A national treasure.”
CLASSIC ROCK /THE BLUES
“Awash with wit, lust and distraction…..the cleverest writer and most magnetic performer of Blues in the UK.”
MOJO
