Soulard Blues Band
“If there’s one thing proven by the Soulard Blues Band’s string of consecutive wins as Best Blues act in the RFT Music Poll, it’s this: Never underestimate the power of a brand name.
The Soulard Blues Band is not just any band!
It is not every band you run across that has a mission beyond just steady giggin’, but then again, as one of the longest-lasting acts around – and with nine straight wins in the “Best Blues Band” category in a popular local poll – the Soulard Blues Band is not just any band.
Art Dwyer, founding member of the SBB
Art Dwyer formed the Soulard Blues Band in 1978, “just a long-haired guy in blue jeans and sandals,” motivated in part by memories of the St. Louis of his childhood, when clubs with names like Shalimar and Oasis and the Peppermint Lounge and Sadie’s Personality Bar jumped with live music and people “dressed up looking flashy” any night of the week, and fifty cents’ cover got you in to Ike and Tina Turner’s set at the Club Imperial. As bassist and sole remaining founder Art Dwyer will tell you, “Our mission always is just to leave things around a little better than we found ’em.”
“They seem to have been around forever and like their home neighborhood,
Soulard Blues Band has a down home feel that has stood the test of time!”
SBB REVIEWS
Blues may be in its name, but the Soulard Blues Band brings a distinctive touch to just about any musical style around. As Duke Ellington used to say, there are really only two kinds of music – good and bad. Evidently, SBB has found the secret to producing the good kind – year after year after year.”
– Terry Perkins
Anchored by bassist/raconteur/bon vivant Art Dwyer, the SBB has preserved on the local scene for close to a quarter-century now, weathering good times and bad and enduring many personnel changes along the way. (Among the band’s more famous alumni are singer and character actor Jim Byrnes, a regular on the TV series Wiseguy and Highlander, and Larry Thurston, who’s done several tours as vocalist for the Blues Brothers Band.) They’ve established a solid following for their gigs at Broadway Oyster Bar, the Great Grizzly Bear and the other clubs around town and have taken their act on the road throughout Missouri, Illinois and the wider world, even recording one of their albums live in Stuttgart, Germany.
As the SBB’s style has evolved over the years beyond straight-up blues to include R&B and soul, as well as touches of jazz, zydeco and funk, they’ve remained a constant presence on the local scene. It may be true that in some circumstances familiarity breeds contempt, but for SBB and St.Louis blues fans, familiarity would seem to breed contentment.
– Dean Minderman
SBB VIDEOS
SBB at Broadway Oyster Bar
"Mister Doughnut Blues"
The SBB Live - Full Concert
As bassist and sole remaining founder Art Dwyer will tell you, “Our mission always is just to leave things around a little better than we found ’em.”