The September 2024 Blues night at Temperance in Leamington Spa was taken over (for 1 month only!) by the Upton Blues Festival Director of Music (and Leamington Spa resident) Stephen ‘Stein’ Steinhaus and his band formally called Upton Blues Festival Under the Bridge All Stars. They were joined by Steve Ferbrache (The Achievers) and Holly Hewitt & Pete Gardner from Holly & The Hounds.
View the night images in the Image Gallery
After Stein’s typical American (Chicago) intro to the evening he introduced Steve Ferbrache. Steve is well known for performing with 5-piece band from Stroud The Achievers, but this evening was the first date on a pre-tour gig for his solo project.
As Steve introduced himself, he explained that these were songs written 25 years earlier, but never released before now. He was waiting for the time and courage to sing them. It was also the first time he will have toured without The Achievers.
His style was more folk, but with a bit of blues thrown in on songs such as ‘Home’ with its great acoustic guitar and evocative lyrics. The next song ‘Walking with the Captain’ was from a time when Steve was very down and thinking of ending it, but music meant he didn’t. The song had great passionate vocals.
The next song ‘Laura’ went back to time when he was 19 and still based in North Wales and after avoiding some issues and the army he was taken to the local folk club and he then fell in love with roots and acoustic music. The song was about his first love who loved horses, but he is now happily married to a different Laura!
He followed this with an acoustic version of an The Achievers song ‘No One Remembers’ which he wrote the lyrics to with Robert Holmes writing the guitar line.
He finished with ‘The Star of the Hill’ which was about saving lives in the seas off Quilty, Ireland and how it helped him recover from an illness relating to working with vulnerable children in the US. The song had some great lyrics which Steve sang very passionately. He finished with ‘Greatest Days’ about waking up at a party and it was all over, and he felt well again.
After this very personal set from Steve, which received great applause, next up was Holly Hewitt (vocals) and Pete Garner (guitar) from group Holly & The Hounds and they gave a great set with lots of passionate and soulful vocals and great guitar picking.
This kicked off with ‘Evil Gal Blues’ with its bluesy vocals and bluesy guitar picking and followed with a Louis Jordan song ‘Early in the Mourning’ with its lovely soulful vocals.
The set also included songs from blues greats such as Bonny Raitt, Memphis Minnie and Earl Jones.
They also covered Canadian Linda Ortega’s song ‘Voodoo Mamma’ with its great bluesy New Orleans style vocals and strong blues guitar, and a song from the deep south & its railways ‘It Won’t Be Long’ with its great blues guitar start. They finished to wild applause with ‘Love Me Like a Man’.
After a break the band formally known as Upton Blues Festival Under the Bridge All Stars took to the stage.
Their line-up was Stephen ‘Stein’ Steinhaus (vocals), Jay Riley (sax), Jason Page (guitar) Matt Ball (keys), Joelle Barker (drums), Valerie Vet (vocals), and Nick Lyndon (Double bass).
They first started with a couple of instrumental numbers allowing Jay Riley on tenor sax and Jason Page on guitar to show their skills. With Stein now joining them on vocals they kicked into a great rendition of ‘Stormy Monday’ before Jason took the vocals on ‘Further On Up the Road’ Stein invited Holly Hewitt up to sing the vocals on ‘Got My Mojo Working’. Val Vet joined in with a couple of numbers with her great soulful voice with Holly joining her with backing vocals on ‘Tennessee Whisky’ with a great keyboard break from Matt.
Then with Stein on shaker percussion Val sang passionately on ‘Forget You’. The evening ended with a jam with Pete & Holly joining on ‘Red House Over Yonder’ with solos from Joelle on drums and Matt on keyboards to great applause at the end.
