The Hot Springs Blues Fest will return this September under new management and, for the first time, will be a free event.
"Visit Hot Springs has agreed to ... keep the Hot Springs Blues Fest going for another year," said Bill Solleder, Visit Hot Springs' director of marketing.
The previous organizer, the Spa City Blues Society, disbanded during the pandemic, according to Solleder. The society's website says the account has been suspended, and its Facebook page says it is "not available."
"It has been really hard on festivals and nonprofit organizations to keep alive through the pandemic and unfortunately the Hot Springs Blues Society has become one of those organizations that didn't make it," Solleder said.
Visit Hot Springs is hosting the festival this year partly because it had "agreed to assist the Blues Festival."
"We already sort of had commitments to the artists who are coming to the Blues Festival, so we decided to take it on," he said.
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Solleder also said that he decided to tackle the new project because he recently made a trip to Clarksdale, Miss., the "Birthplace of the Blues" and home of the "crossroads," where legendary blues musician Robert Johnson supposedly sold his soul to the devil.
"Personally, and to put a silver lining on a cloud, I had recently gone to Clarksdale, Miss., for the Juke Joint Festival and had taken on a new appreciation for the blues and the people, and the community that makes the blues a cool culture. So I got jazzed up by what happened in Clarksdale and I want to bring a little bit of that here to Hot Springs," Solleder said.
The festival will be held Sept. 3 and 4 at Hill Wheatley Plaza with Spa City Youngbloods, Try Johnson & Jason Willman, and The Ghost Town Blues Band performing on Sept. 3, and Port City Blues Society Players, BB Queen, and Reba Russell playing on Sept. 4.
"One thing to note, and I think this is really important, is that the Blues Fest has always been a ticketed event and this will be the first time, as far as I can remember, that it will be absolutely free and for all," Solleder said.
Solleder said that while the nonprofit society depended on tickets to present the Blues Festival, "we just reached into our events budget to be able to just pay for it. I feel it will bring more people to town."
The Blues Festival will not likely be an ongoing festival for Visit Hot Springs, though.
"The word I'm getting out on the street and I'm trying to reach out to the blues community is Visit Hot Springs would like for someone to take over the Hot Springs Blues Festival in 2022. Doesn't mean that the Spa Blues Society would come back; it could be a brand-new organization, maybe someone young, someone with some energy and definitely someone with love for the blues to keep the tradition going," Solleder said.
While this is the first time that Visit Hot Springs has staged the festival, Solleder is familiar with the event. Prior to his work with VHS, Solleder was the founder and executive director of Low Key Arts, which ran the Hot Water Hills Music and Arts Festival.
"And that festival took place right here in Hill Wheatley Plaza, where Blues Fest happens, and when I was planning that festival I had reached out to the person who was running the Spa Blues Society, and that was David Hughes. David Hughes was so kind to take me around the grounds and show me the ins and outs," Solleder said.
"For many, many years I had come to the Blues Festival to see how they did things so I could apply that to Hot Water Hills and other events that have happened here since then," he said.
Solleder said that the Blues Festival has "been a staple for many, many years."
"There was a strong amount of people that love the blues, whether they are here locally and look forward to it every year, but there's a great community around, not just in Arkansas, but the entire region. There's strong, strong roots the blues has in (the) Delta in Arkansas and to see it go away from a vibrant community like Hot Springs would just be a shame and that's part of the reason I want to keep it going," he said.
In addition to Blues Fest, Solleder said that there will be two other events going on in the Bridge Street Live Entertainment District.
"So during Blues Fest -- this will be fun -- Friday and Saturday will be Blues Festival; this is Labor Day weekend. The Big Pickle, which is the outdoor pickleball festival, will be happening down Malvern and Bridge Street and into the Farmers Market, and Jazz Fest will take place on Saturday under the Regions Broadway Bridge ... so that's going to be a big weekend for music and pickleball and just events, and the entire Bridge Street Live Entertainment District will be taken up," he said.
