Newsletter #9
TCBBS NEWLETTER #9
Hey Blues Fans! In this newsletter we will be sharing what the TCBBS and what our members, bands and venue are up to.
Our new Treasurer, Scott Graham, has been doing a great job regarding our 501c3 status, and State and Federal red tape that we have to deal with.
The original plan for the Jak Payne Scholarship was to partner with Del Mar College and establish a scholarship in Jak’s name. They would have handled all the back-end vetting of students for us to pick from to receive the funds. The only downside for us was that they required a $5k commitment over 3 years and we aren’t sure if amount may be more than we receive in donations towards the scholarship fund in that timeframe.
So, we were looking into other ways of doing it. Believe it or not, giving a grant or scholarship away can be complicated. We were even turned down by the Autism Office at the local Navy Base as we wanted them to give Autism Awareness Funds we had raised to local military families with Autistic children. They said no. They weren’t allowed to do that. We ended up giving it to the Texas Autism Society and they were very appreciative. It’s a learning process for us.
Celeste Trevino, the Director of the Jak Payne Scholarship fund saw a post about Leonardo Riccardo on FaceBook. He is a skilled guitar player that went to King High School locally and was playing in a local popular band called the Young Klassics. Anyway, he was recently accepted into the Berklee School of Music in Boston, which is like being accepted into Julliard as a dancer. Celeste recognized his name as he was a member of the TCBBS. We talked about it and I discussed it with our treasurer and we decided to give the scholarship to Leo this year, after the vetting criteria was done. We are all very happy for Leo embarking on this new chapter in his musical life and we are very happy that the vision to keep Jak Payne’s love of mentoring young musicians, even after his passing in 2023, has come to fruition. Leo is the first of many to receive a scholarship as we plan on doing it every year.
As for member bands, the John Cortez Band has been getting around locally and playing up in San Antonio on a regular basis. We saw John lay down some scorching lead guitar as a special guest with Tyrone Vaughn (Jimmy Vaughn’s son and SRV’s nephew) last night. Rich Lockhart is now a TCBBS member and his band plays all over the Coastal bend and further up the coast frequently and just opened for Tyrone Vaughn last night at the same show. We gave Tyrone Vaughn an honorary membership as we did with Chris Duarte when he played at our blues festival in June. Both of those guys are super nice and approachable and very entertaining. The Palacios Brothers are all over South Texas and are getting ready for an East Coast tour and then heading to Europe to expand their fanbase. The FBI Blues Band has returned to playing after a long hiatus after the passing of their harp player, and our original Treasurer, Mario “Hambone” Lopez. The FBI Blues Band has been asked back to the Texas Jazz Festival for a 3rd year in a row and will be representing the TCBBS at that great festival in October. Spit Cup and the Jukes have been gigging around central Texas, and we look forward to them getting back down here to play in the Coastal Bend. The Bayside Volunteer Jam Band has also been gigging around the Coastal Bend, mainly in Rockport, Corpus Christi and Bayside.
Dorado’s Bar and Grill in Aransas Pass has just renewed their venue membership and they have given us their venue to host events on multiple occasions, and we really appreciate them being supporters. The Exchange is under renovation, and we are looking forward to checking out the new and improved Exchange soon. Donna T’s Sugar Shack in Rockport is still packing the house nightly with live music and we are glad to call her our friend as well as a venue sponsor. She has hired many of our member bands and everyone has a great time gigging there. We anticipate several new venues joining soon and our new general membership is growing. Just yesterday a trombone player from Austin joined named Glen Foster. We have members from all over. George Ferry is a member, and he is a harp player in New Jersey. Dan Grigor is a twelve-string Maestro from New York. Dado Radmanovic is a blues fanatic from Croatia. They are all members of the TCBBS!
The Hambone Blues Jam has returned to the Rialto Theater and is currently once a month. The next one is September 14th at 4 pm. It’s a lot of fun and hosted by the TCBBS and the Rialto Theater, otherwise known as the South Texas Blues Epicenter.
We will keep you posted on new developments, and we encourage you to tell your friends about the TCBBS and recommend they join too!
Frank Butler
President/TCBBS