90s, a large group of friends, musicians and fans of #blues, #funky, #soul and surroundings, a stage van and sponsors who simply provided electricity, beers and hospitality. It is the #BluesMachine, the historic Policorese formation from which dozens of bands were born and in which many professional musicians were trained. In that period of healthy and easy-going aggregation, the first two “embryonic” editions of Blues in Town also came to life, in 1995 and 1996, again in Policoro, again in Piazza Segni.

The same big band, on the stage of Blues in Town 2017, celebrated its 25th birthday.

Finally it begins, the Antonio Segni Amphitheater fills with excitement after years of total inactivity and, blessed by a constant rain that “refreshed” the three days of August, the small stage is lit up with special guests.

Many bands of friends to open the evenings (a format that has become a constant for all editions of the festival) and then they, the first three big names of our event: the Roman guitarist Francesca De Fazi, the first unforgettable international guest Sharrie Williams Official and the godfather of our festival, Roberto Ciotti.

In spite of the adverse weather conditions, as if Policoro had always been waiting for that music, in front of that stage there was the audience of great occasions. Good first!

While three is the perfect number, Blues in Town takes this rule literally; 2006 is the year of confirmation and awareness, the event has already found its place among the important events of our district and the thousands of people who filled the Segni Amphitheater for all four evenings are the proof.

The choice of the cast of the third edition played its part in the success of the Kermesse: Harlem harmonica player James Whiting “Sugar Blue”, saxophonist Waldo Weathers from Kentucky and the stainless Enzo Avitabile accompanied, for the first time in the summer in 2006, by the powerful brigade of the Bottari di Portico, for the first time in Basilicata at Blues i Town.

The icing on the cake of the third edition is the presence of the Lucanian actor Rocco Papaleo, known to the general public, until then, only as a film and theater actor. Casually discovering his passion for music, Papaleo was invited to the festival and, immediately, he proved happy but very skeptical about the “theatrical cut” of his musical performances, not suitable, according to him, for a stage like that of Blues in Town.

Arriving in the square on the afternoon of his performance, he congratulated us on the organization, underlining his amazement with the phrase “wow what have you armed!”, obviously pronounced in the strict Lauriota dialect. Until a moment before going on stage he remarked the skepticism of performing in front of those thousands of people who attentively followed the concert of the band that preceded him then, having gained the scene, here is the histrion we all know … jokes, very sweet and funny songs, and the Lucanian hymn Ba Ba Basilicata, have literally entranced the Polycorese public. Also a precious cameo during Papaleo’s evening, the intervention of another of our famous countrymen, the Montalbanese actor Antonio Petrocelli.

Another 5 days of unforgettable international music that mark the path of the event. The opening is entrusted to the exceptional pianist and singer from Pesaro Mattew Lee (for the first time in Basilicata and now used to our region); in the second evening the “tough” Californian rocker Gail Muldrow is the protagonist; in the central evening of the festival, a true blues guitar giant arrives from New Orleans, Eugene Hideway Bridges; on 13 August one of the greatest Italian representatives of the blues, the Veronese guitarist Rudy Rotta, takes the stage of the Blues in Town; the closing of this edition bears a classy signature, from the Mississippi delta comes to enchant the amphitheater Segni Keith B Brown, the great artist from Memphis, also known for his starring role in the film “The Soul of a Man” , directed by Martin Scorsese.