Jus' Blues Music Foundation

Twenty-five years in and just getting started – the Jus’ Blues Music Foundation keeps growing and finding new ways to support and celebrate the deepest roots of America’s music. The Foundation is a long-standing nonprofit working to preserve blues heritage through performances and education.

Best known for the Jus’ Blues Music Awards and Conference held each summer in Tunica, MS, the Foundation does much more. It also regularly presents workshops on how to use technology to reach new audiences, brings blues into schools, offers songwriting workshops and sponsors tours of blues heritage locations. If it’s something to do with advocating the blues, you can bet Jus’ Blues is working to support it.

For example, their annual event hosts a two-day Technology Conference featuring presentations from renowned blues artists, attorneys, historians and social media marketers on the various ways to better promote, protect, market, sell and get music heard in today’s technological age.

The Foundation also boasts the impressive “Blues Got A Soul” (BGAS) initiative, which brings educational programs to youth and adults, to help inspire a deep understanding and lifelong appreciation of the music. BGAS programs include classes on blues history and legends, the business of music, blues lyrics, women in blues, Delta blues preservation, technical workshops, instruments, and blues artist performances, jam sessions and meetand-greets. For instance, the BGAS’s 2020 Black History Month presented to over 100 students from the Shelby County, TN, school

Founder and CEO Charles Mitchell (lt) and legendary blues Drummer Tony “TC” Coleman (ctr) with BGAS’s Best Academy students. Photo courtesy of Jus’ Blues Music Foundation

Celebrating 25 Years!

system. Presentations covered the history of Beale Street by Music Specialist Allen Johnston, the life and legacy of Memphis Minnie by songstress Toni Green, the history of how B.B. King came to Beale Street by B.B. King Museum Operations Director Robert Terrell, the history of the harmonica and the blues by Damion “Yella P” Pierson, and stories and performance by historian, educator and Grammy Award-winning bluesman Bobby Rush. Instilling the significance of blues history and love for blues music in today’s youth ensures a healthy future for the blues.

The Foundation’s crown jewel, the Jus’ Blues Music Awards, began back in 1995 as the Atlanta Heritage Blues Festival. Founder and CEO Charles Mitchell has been working in the music industry for over 30 years. He explains, “I grew up hearing this music. It’s what my parents listened to. I love it.” Though the Awards show has evolved and moved on from Georgia, to Beale Street in Memphis, to the Mississippi Delta, Jus’ Blues has always operated with the central goal of recognizing blues and soul artists who are frequently overlooked.

The Jus’ Blues experience was conceptualized and has been led from its earliest days by African Americans who are determined to keep their music alive. Jus’ Blues events are an immersion into the African American cultural experience with a large, welcoming family of artists and attendees all celebrating the origins of the blues, as well as the many new styles emerging as the genre continues to evolve.

“Honoring the wonderful work of musicians and other industry professionals, no matter what color or nationality they are, is important. Jus’ Blues is dedicated to recognizing Black blues and soul artists who don’t always get recognition from mainstream media, and often don’t even get to perform at large blues festivals,” says Mitchell.

Mitchell’s drive has been to keep blues history alive and blues men and women working and recording. This intention can be seen in the names of the individual awards given out each year, which are named in honor of blues legends including B.B. and Albert King, Koko Taylor, Little Milton and Muddy Waters – ensuring their contributions to the blues remains front and center in our collective memory.

Bobby "Blue" Bland, Denise LaSalle and Bobby Rush have all been regular attendees of the Awards show and, at times, performers as well. Latimore, Theodis Ealey, Millie Jackson, Willie Clayton and Trudy Lynn have also participated in the growth of the Foundation.

Big Bill Morganfield proudly displays "The Muddy" Lifetime Blues Award he received at the 2016 Jus’ Blues Music Awards. Photo courtesy of Jus’ Blues Music Foundation

Rush, one of those rare bluesmen to receive mainstream attention, finally got a Grammy in his 80s. “I’m one of the last ones left. We’ve got to find a way to keep this music going.” The Jus’ Blues Music Award Show does just that – bringing to light these artists who contribute so greatly to the genre.

Jus’ Blues also focuses on a younger generation – many of whom play what is left of the Southern soul circuit. Ms. Jody, O.B. Buchana, Lola Gulley, Grady Champion, Zac Harmon, Karen Wolfe and many others offer some real hope that this music has a bright future. By making these introductions, attendees get to hear some of their favorites and discover a few performers they had never heard before.

Mitchell says, “Everyone should come to have a good time. For the artists and music professionals, it’s network, network, network. It’s a great place to connect with people. They’re all here.”

To date, the Foundation’s Music Award Show has honored almost 250 musicians, songwriters and other industry professionals that have helped keep the blues alive.

Mitchell says, “We are just getting started. I have so many ideas and there is so much to do.”

This year, the Jus’ Blues Music Awards and Conference will take place July 29-August 1. To learn more about the Jus’ Blues Music Foundation and its programs, visit www.jusblues.org.

Blues icon Bobby Rush plays oil can guitar at a BGAS youth camp. Photo courtesy of Jus’ Blues Music Foundation