Marcia Ball & Tinsley Ellis

Tinsley Ellis and Marcia Ball are excited to present an intimate evening of their music and memories called Acoustic Songs and Stories. They will each play a set of their own songs. Tinsley, an elder statesman of the Blues world, will perform many of his most popular songs from his twenty albums, plus some delta blues and classics on his National Steel and Martin acoustic guitars. Marcia, a five-time Grammy nominee, will play the piano and sing her often raucous and sometimes touching original songs full of the characters and places that shaped her.

Throughout his long, constantly evolving career, guitarist, singer and songwriter Tommy Castro has always remained true to himself while exploring, growing and creating new music, and he has taken his thousands of devoted fans right along with him. Since his solo debut in 1994, he’s made 16 albums—the last seven for Alligator—each its own unique chapter in the book of Tommy Castro. Ranging from horn-fueled R&B to piping hot blues to fiery, stripped-down rock ‘n’ roll, each release is solidly built upon Tommy’s unshakable musical foundation—a dynamic mix of 1960s-influenced guitar-fueled blues, testifying Memphis-soaked blue-eyed soul and Latin-tinged East San Jose funk, all driven by Castro’s grab-you-by-the-collar vocals and passionate guitar work.

Since his earliest infatuations with guitar, Carl “Buffalo” Nichols has asked himself the same question: How can I bring the blues of the past into the future? After cutting his teeth between a Baptist church and bars in Milwaukee, it was a globetrotting trip through West Africa and Europe during a creative down period that began to reveal the answer.

Peter Madcat Ruth is one of the best harmonica players on earth, a mainstay of Ann Arbor’s blues scene since the 1970s and a carrier of tradition who learned his art directly from Chicago’s masters of the blues harmonica. Don’t miss this chance to see a Michigan legend. Tonight Madcat appears with his C.A.R.Ma. Quartet, featuring drummer/tabla player John Churchville, bassist Brennan Andes, and guitarist/vocalist Dan Ripke.