PORT TOWNSEND — Those attending this summer’s Centrum festivals at Fort Worden State Park are treated to an eye-popping visual experience in the form of giant artists portraits.
The doors of the main venue, McCurdy Pavilion, are now decorated with two 47-foot-by-30-foot representations of featured musicians.
“We wanted to create more of a festival atmosphere with something that can be seen from outside the fence,” said Rob Birman, Centrum executive director.
“It used to be flat gray space. When I first saw this, I thought it should be a place for billboards.”
The featured musicians are Steve James, a participant and instructor at this week’s Port Townsend Acoustic Blues Festival, and Regina Carter, a violinist who was a featured performer at last week’s Jazz Port Townsend.
Birman said the pictures were chosen “because they were powerful images,” but diversity also was a consideration.
“We wanted to balance it between male-female, Caucasian and African-American, and blues and jazz,” Birman said, although Carter’s presence is a bonus as her instrument provides a nod to the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes that was held June 28-July 5.
Both murals cost $4,000 and were supported by a grant from Windermere Port Townsend.
They are printed on weather-resistant vinyl mesh, Birman said, and there is no decision as to whether more images will be produced.
On Tuesday, James, one of the subjects of the murals, visited the site for a photo shoot and a discussion about the art of acoustic blues.
He told why he has attended almost every single festival since it began in 1992.
“It has grown and changed, with a conscious effort on the part of the organizers to get more young people involved and for it to be more diverse,” James said.
James, 65, began playing the blues when he was a teenager.
He followed some of its biggest names — “I lived in New York and hitchhiked to Philadelphia at the drop of a hat to see [guitarist] Brownie McGhee,” he said.
While blues is often considered an old man’s game, James is now older than almost all of those he admired at the time.
“Music is a form of craft, art and technique. With all of these things, the longer you do it, the better you get,” he said.
Blues, he said, is different than other forms of music, as it is not a celebrity-driven pop phenomenon.
And if music is language, he said, blues is a dialect.
“It has to mean something, and the language needs to be used in a way that is understandable,” he said.
“What we tell people here is that if you want to make music, you can; that it’s your privilege as a human being.
“If you want to make music, just pick that thing up and play it.”
The Acoustic Blues Festival, which began Sunday, resembles a blues summer camp, with classes, jams and formal and informal performances for musicians from across the nation.
This year, it includes 250 participants and 35 instructors, according to Mary Hilts, program director.
“This festival has a warm, down-home vibe,” Hilts said.
“It’s welcoming, and the music just rocks your soul.”
Many of the participants are the same from year to year, but the new discoveries promote growth and make each event better than the last, she said.
Part of the growth is a new artistic director, 26-year-old Jerron Paxton.
“I’ve come here since I was 19 years old,” Paxton said.
“It’s the only acoustic blues festival that I know in the United States, which is a shame but also makes it a very happy place to be.”
Mark Hoffman of Bainbridge Island, a technical writer by day and a blues guitarist at night, also has attended most of the recent festivals.
“Some of the best acoustic blues players are here year after year,” Hoffman said.
“If you want to get inspired by playing music and enrich your soul, this is the place to do it.”
The public component of the festival includes two nights of Blues in the Clubs on Friday and Saturday.
A $25 wristband gives the wearer access to performances in six locations in downtown Port Townsend: Key City Public Theatre, the Old Whiskey Mill (formerly the Public House), the American Legion, the Boiler Room, the Cellar Door and the Cotton Building.
The Acoustic Blues Showcase begins at 1:30 p.m. Saturday at McCurdy Pavilion.
It will feature Paxton, Alice Stuart, Andy Cohen, Beareather Reddy, Cyd Smith, Gene Taylor, Jerie Choi, Lightnin’ Wells, Michael Jerome Browne, Samuel James, The Sherman Holmes Project with Brooks Long and Cora Harvey Armstrong, Terry Waldo and Tom Feldmann.
Tickets are $43, $33 or $23, based on one’s seating. They are available at www.centrum.org or by calling 800-746-1982.
Tickets also will be available at the box office beginning one hour before the show.
For more details, including show times and venues, see Friday’s Peninsula Spotlight, the Peninsula Daily News’ weekly arts and entertainment magazine.
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
