How to go
What: Dayton Blues Society’s Birthday Bash
Where: Oregon Express, 336 E. Fifth St., Dayton
When: 8 p.m. Saturday
Cost: Free
More info: (937) 223-9205, www.oregonexpressdayton.com or www.daytonbluessociety.com
Considering the number of events the Dayton Blues Society promotes each year, it’s hard to believe the local organization only started accepting members at the 2008 Dayton Blues Festival. Today, the group holds a monthly blues jam, an annual cancer event, the Winter Blues Showcase and two events in July.
The Dayton Blues Society is celebrating its first five years with its annual Birthday Bash at Oregon Express in Dayton on Saturday. The Noah Wotherspoon Band will headline the event.
“In the past we’ve always had an open jam at the normal time,” Hill said. “It would start at 5 o’clock and be over by 9. This year we decided to do something a little different. We’ll have kind of a blues date night. You can bring your wife out, have some good food here at the O.E. and enjoy some blues.”
Ralph & the Rhythm Hounds will open the show with a performance at 8 p.m. The Cincinnati group features Ralph Cave and his 19-year-old son Noah Cave.
“Noah is a nice young man and a great guitar player and vocalist,” Hill said. “He reminds me a lot of Jimi Hendrix. The Noah Wotherspoon Band will take the stage at 9 p.m. Later on Noah Cave will get up with Noah Wotherspoon and play.”
Wotherspoon, the winner of the band category at the Dayton Blues Society’s 2012 Road to Memphis Blues Challenge, was only 13 when he started wowing local crowds in the mid-1990s. He’ll also be joined Saturday by another rising blues guitarist Joe Tellmann, 13, from Springboro.
“Playing with Noah is going to be a highlight for Joe,” Hill said. “He’s been coming to our jams and really impressing people. We all know that without the youth the blues is going to die, so we’ve got to cultivate that and who better to host it than Noah because we all have our stories of how old Noah was the first time we saw him.
“That’s going to be a really great event,” Hill continued. “It’s not only blues date night but it’s also a youth showcase. That’s going to be really nice. I told Noah he can invite up anybody else he wants. I just want him to make it a nice party and have fun with it.”
Next up for Dayton Blues Society is the Road to Memphis Blues Challenge at Gilly’s on July 28. The winners in the solo/duo and band categories advance to the International Blues Challenge in Memphis in February.
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