THE BLUES TALKS celebrate Centrum’s Acoustic Blues workshop/festival with three 30-minute conversations held over three days, recorded during the 2023 Centrum Acoustic Blues workshop at Fort Worden State Park in Port Townsend, WA USA.

Hosted by Mark Puryear, the first session begins with an exploration of the thin line between Gospel and Blues. A panel of faculty artists brought up in gospel shared their thoughts and experiences participating in both gospel and the secular world. The second session focused on early acoustic blues, its importance in people’s culture socially, its origins and how it changed the world. Artist faculty steeped in knowledge of early blues shared this panel. The third and final session spoke to how the blues are not static, how they evolved, and how the musicians evolved. This session explored the evolution of the blues and early electric blues with a panel of artist faculty who play both.