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Outdoor setting adds color to Blues Fest at Covelli
By Denise Dick
Youngstown
Blues fans brought their lawn and camp chairs — and coats and sweatshirts — to hear two blues legends rock the Covelli Centre.
Center personnel expected about 1,000 fans to the outdoor concert Saturday of the City of Youngstown’s Blues Fest presented by Tangled up in Blues.
The concert featured legendary artists Buddy Guy and Robert Cray.
Margie and Len Chianese of Austintown; their three sons, David, a Youngstown State University senior, Rick, a junior at Fitch High School, and Marc, a freshman at YSU, and family friend Ed Baun of Youngstown sat on the grass that lines the lot to take in the show.
“The last time we saw Buddy Guy, we went all the way to Hamilton, Ontario, and took them out of school to go,” Len said.
That was about five years ago.
At that concert, Guy focused on showing the audience how other guitarists play, he said, adding that he hoped for a different show at Saturday’s concert.
“I hope he plays his own stuff,” Len said.
The family says they enjoy the music of both Guy and Cray.
“I just like the blues,” David said.
Several years ago, the family attended the B.B. King concert at Powers Auditorium.
Cornel Bogdan of Tangled Up in Blues told the crowd it would be hard to top this year’s concert next year.
“There’s not a finer lineup than Buddy Guy and Robert Cray together on one night,” he said.
Singer-songwriter Cray is a five-time Grammy Award winner and recently released “This Time,” a studio album.
Guy, also a five-time Grammy winner, is a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee. Earlier this year, he appeared in “Shine A Light,” a Rolling Stones concert film by Martin Scorsese.
Saturday marked the first time that Randy and Brenda Caldwell of Newton Falls saw either of the two music icons in concert.
Since the Mahoning Valley doesn’t typically draw a lot of blues acts, they were pleased when they learned of the concert at Covelli.
“When we saw that, we said we’ve got to go,” Randy said.
He’s been a fan of Cray and Guy since the 1980s, and though some blues purists may quibble that Cray doesn’t fall squarely in that genre, Randy still calls it blues.
“He has his own style,” he said.
Deb Karis of Canfield says she and her husband, Mike, have been Guy and Cray fans for 25 to 30 years. Saturday marked the first time they would see them in concert.
“We have all of their CDs and all of their music on our iPods,” she said.