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John Peel OBE, 1939 - 2004
Perry Foster
Many
of the blues enthusiasts who remember the great blues package tours of the
Sixties will be sure to recognise the raw, immediate Delta style of the solo
acoustic Country Blues they are likely to hear in PERRY FOSTER's sets.
Perry's interest in the blues began when he first heard recordings of Big Bill Broonzy, Leadbelly, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee on a Burl Ives programme on the radio. He went out and bought himself a banjo, but soon traded it in for a 12-string guitar.
During the Sixties, down in London, he was associated with the original YARDBIRDS, but, as their music became more 'pop' orientated he left them and stuck with the blues. He took any opportunity of meeting and playing along with such greats as HOWLING WOLF, REV. GARY DAVIS, TERRY & McGEE, SLEEPY JOHN ESTES and of course, SONNY BOY WILLIAMSON, for whom he acted as a 'minder' for a while, who gave him a blues harp Perry still plays during his gigs to this day.
Around this time, back in the Midlands, he formed his `Delta Blues Band' which was noted as a hotbed of talent: local musicians he recruited were CHRIS WOOD, later of `TRAFFIC' and a very young ROBERT PLANT, of LED ZEPPELIN, on vocals and washboard!
He has been playing the country blues ever since, even during the years when he was working in the oil industry both off-shore and abroad, taking up music professionally again in 1989, when he created a sensation with his solo sets at the 1st Burnley National Blues Festival and was featured in the hour-long GRANADA TV documentary "Burnley Sings the Blues".
Perry Foster is now recognised to be one of the leading country bluesmen in Britain. His appearances on B.B.C. television and numerous radio slots have received enthusiastic audience reaction. He has played at every major blues festival in the U.K. and at many others, both in Europe and the U.S.A. and joined up again lately with his old Led Zeppelin colleague when he completed a tour with one of ROBERT PLANT's bands.
Perry's full-blooded, gritty vocals and driving slide guitar create an atmosphere redolent of the old bluesmen, but stamped with his own, inimitable, personality and irrepressible Black Country humour. He continues to be dubbed the `BIG DADDY of the BLUES' by fellow musicians.
“I was turned on to the blues by
a guy named Perry Foster”
Robert Plant (“Story of Led Zeppelin”)
Check out Perry's latest
Gig List
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White. All Rights Reserved.