music

European Blues Challenge – EBC2026

| concert, expo

I have attended almost all the European Blues Challenges since the very beginning, when it started in Berlin in 2011. In those days I had just bought a new digital camera and I was returning to concert photography. In that first year of the EBC I didn’t take many pictures because I was a newbie on the blues scene.

But since then, and except for 2014, I attended all the editions of the EBC and each was really a great and fun experience meeting the members of the Euroopean Blues Union (EBU) : a mix of festival organizers, blues associations, national blues magazines or broadcasters, and of course musicians and people in the record industry. It’s also great to discover new bands from all over Europe.

The format of the challenge starts with 2 nights of semi-finals – usually thursday and friday – where 10-12 bands (12 this this year) compete each night. The 4 best bands of each semi-final night are selected for the finals on the saturday. If you followed, that’s 8 bands on stage for the final on saturday.

The event says “challenge” in the title, but as a member of the Swiss Blues Society who organises of the Swiss Blues Challenge, I always tell the musicians that they should consider this event mainly as a social event, a great opportunity to meet and great people from everywhere in Europe, make new friends and have the chance to play in front of many festival director and bookers. I know a lot of bands who never reached the podium in any of those challenges, but started getting gigs outside their town, or region because other people noticed them in the challenges-

Here below are the winners of the European Blues Challenge. Check their websites or listen to them on your favorite music provider, they are all outstanding:

Winner – Adama Janlo, from Norway

Second – Gloria and the Doctors, from Italy

Third – SirJo Cocchi & Balta Bordoy – The Blues Way, from Spain

Winner of the solo/duo act – Tom Eylenboch, from Belgium

In addition some special prizes were awarded: René Rothacher (Eve Gallagher, Switzerland) won the the prize for best guitarist at the EBC, Richard Koster (The Hoochies, Netherlands) was the best Harmonica player.
My friend photographer Frank Nielsen received a “Blues Behind the Scenes” Award in the category “Media”, Runar Lia (Notodden Blues Festival) received this prize in the catgory “Promoter” and Marcin Krupa (Mayor, Katowice) received a special prize for the city of Katowice, the new “Blues Capital in Europe”.

      EBC2026 – Selection

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      Carmel

      | 1P1S, concert, music

      I became a fan of Carmel in the first 10 seconds I heard her first album released in 1984. I immediately loved her voice and the groove brought in by Jim Parris and Gerry Darby, I had the chance to see her for the first time in Montreux in 1984 and heard her again when she came to Geneva in 1986, where I managed to meet her and show her some of the photos of Montreux.

      I had scanned and published the slides of the 1986 concert in 2010 already, but had not yet scanned those black&white photos taken in 1984 in Montreux. I only remembered that these BW photos were much better than the color slides taken in 1986, for reasons old photographers all know, I might come back to that topic one day.

      I only found one of the prints I made in those days but was surprised to see that it had been signed by Carmel, which I had completely forgotten about. Anyway, it was fun to see those old negatives again.

      Carmel

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      Chris Slade

      | concert

      Chris Slade is a legendary drummer who I have known since the end of the 70s, when Manfred Mann’s Earth Band was spinning all day long on my record player. I was a big fan at the time and still listen to Manfred Mann with great pleasure.

      Yep, I’ve known his name for almost 50 years, and I hadn’t seen him for a long time. The last time was in the 80s when he did, if I remember correctly, demos for a drum company at the Montreux Jazz Festival.

      In summary, in his career he played with Tom Jones, Manfred Mann, David Gilmour, Gary Moore, The Firm and AC/DC, which is quite a nice curriculum for a drummer, right?

      Photo album

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