The Tutors: We have a fantastic musician for this year’s Acoustic Blues Weekend. His name is Faris, and he is an Algerian-Italian who plays a style of guitar music that through artists like Ali Farka Toure and Tinariwen, has become known as Desert Blues.
Faris lives in Italy and has spent many years playing on the Blues scene in Europe. So as well as his mastery of Tuareg Desert Blues guitar, Faris has strong links with the Blues. His musical roots sit as much in the American South as they do in the Sahara Desert. So much so that his debut solo album titled ‘Mississippi to Sahara’ contains material by Skip James, Son House, Fred McDowell, Muddy Waters and Blind Willie Johnson, and has Leo Bud Welch as a guest on two tracks. Faris plays beautiful finger-style acoustic guitar and acoustic lap-style (Weissenborn) slide guitar. Both of these instruments he plays in a style which sits somewhere between the Sahara Desert and the Mississippi Delta, in a way that Blues and Roots music listeners and players can really relate to. As far as I know this is the first time Faris has played in the UK and it is the first time anyone with their roots in the Sahara has taught Desert Blues Guitar in this country. Faris - will be teaching Acoustic Finger-Style 'Tuareg' Desert Blues Guitar & Acoustic Hawaiian Guitar (Weissenborn). Michael Messer will be teaching Bottleneck Slide guitar. He will be explaining and demonstrating the playing styles of the original masters of Blues slide guitar and teaching some of their repertoire. Michael will also hold a finger-style open-tuned session, teaching open-tuned Blues guitar without a slide. Skip James is one of the musicians that will be covered in this class. In addition to Michael Messer's slide guitar classes, Faris is going to spend some time teaching his unique style of slide guitar.
Booking & Ticket Prices: A full weekend of Acoustic Finger-Style and Slide Guitar tuition, plus the 'Acoustic Blues House Party' concert on Saturday night featuring; Faris, Michael Messer, plus guests.... Ticket Prices: Weekend ticket (including Saturday concert) - £135.00 Friday or Sunday ticket - £35.00 Saturday ticket (including concert) - £75 Saturday concert ticket - £10.00