David Vest was onstage with Big Joe Turner and opening for Roy Orbison before he was old enough to vote. Maple Blues Award winner David Vest is an authentic, Southern-bred boogie-woogie piano player and blues shouter
Date/Time: Nov 4 2017, 7:00 pm to 10:30 pm
White Rock, Blue Frog StudiosCost: $47.00
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Born to sharecropper parents in Alabama in 1943, David grew up in Birmingham, near Tuxedo Junction. He played his first paying gig in 1957, and by the time he opened for Roy Orbison on New Year’s Day 1962, he was a seasoned veteran of Gulf Coast roadhouses and honky-tonks.
At the age of 17, David went on tour with Jerry Woodard and the Esquires, some of whom later became key members of the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section and the Muscle Shoals Horns. While still with Woodard, he jammed with Ace Cannon, Bill Black’s Combo and the Jimmy Dorsey Band in clubs along the Florida Panhandle, where fellow Alabaman James Harman would soon make his mark. About the time he turned 21 he found himself onstage backing Big Joe Turner, who said that David Vest’s playing made him feel like he was back home in Kansas City. Later David would receive the "direct laying on of hands" from piano legends like Big Walter The Thunderbird, Katie Webster and Floyd Dixon.
David's many festival appearances include Bumbershoot, King Biscuit, Waterfront (Portland), Winthrop, Edmonton, Calgary, Tremblant, Baltimore, Houston, Ritzville and N.O. Jazzfest (with Miss Lavelle White). Between 2012 and 2016, David won the Maple Blues Award for Piano/Keyboard Player Of The Year three times.
David continues to tour extensively, from small blues joints to major festivals across North America, where he regales crowds with his unmistakably authentic blues sound and stories about the fascinating life of a traveling bluesman. Judging by his live shows and latest recordings, David Vest won’t be slowing down anytime soon.
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