Michael Roach will tell you that he didn’t choose the blues. The blues chose him.
When he first picked up a guitar, this son of South Carolina farming folk had jazz and soul on his mind. That all changed when he found himself sitting at the feet of the the masters of the East Coast Blues.
It has been Michael’s life’s work to carry the torch for the old timers who taught him the blues, Philadelphia Jerry Ricks, John Cephas and John Jackson.
With his trusty metal-bodied National this Kalamazoo favourite became an ambassador for the music that changed his life, taking the message around the world, through Europe, the Middle East, (yes, the Arabs in Dubai love the blues) and to South Africa Sri Lanka and Singapore.
He’s a teacher himself now, runs blues festivals and schools, lectures (Smithsonian Institute and Oxford
University) and broadcasts, too. . But above all he is a performer, one with a brilliant knack of engaging his audience. It is with this act that he hopes to bring about a greater understanding of the blues and the Black experience.