5-9-08 Your last chance to get the Extra Early Camping discount is midnight, Sunday, May 11.  So if you are planning to camp this year at Briggs Farm take advantage of that great discount.  You may order on-line from our ticket page, mail in your order with check (letters post marked no later than May 12 since the post office is closed Sunday), or call us 570-379-2003.  That price is $55. per adult which includes camping and a 2 day concert pass.  The Early camping discount tickets are available from May 12 till June 11 and that price is $60.

 

4-11-08 - Back Porch Stage Artist Added!   Briggs Farm welcomes singer, songwriter & producer Bret Alexander to the Back Porch Stage line-up on Saturday July 12. Bret is a founding member of The Badlees, one of the most successful national groups to come out of Pennsylvania in recent times. Brett joins our other back porch performers including Lonnie Shields, Mikey Jr., and our good friend Mark Armstrong from Nashville. See full line-up on (line-up page). We’ve been talking about having a crawfish boil in addition to ribs, sausage, pulled pork, chicken, and our fresh roast sweet corn. But here’s what I found out today when researching how other festivals do crawfish boils. I went to www.crawfishfest.com and saw some great looking crawfish being boiled in huge tanks for this festival held at the end of May. Got very excited! So I decided to call Michael Arnone, the guy who produces the crawfish festival and he told me that we can’t do it in July because fresh crawfish are out of season then. I figure he must know what he’s talking about since he lives in Louisiana and has been cooking crawfish for his festival for 19 years. What does a farm boy from Pennsylvania know about crawfish anyway? Then he tried to talk me into cooking alligator sausage instead, more on that later. I want to check it out before I make an official alligator at Briggs Farm announcement.

 

3-25-08- The main stage line-up; BIG GEORGE BROCK, NORA JEAN BRUSO, JOHNNY RAWLS, KELLY RICHEY, CLARENCE SPADY, COLIN JOHN and MICHAEL HILL, BOBBY KYLE, and the SARAH AYERS BAND.  A powerful and exciting lineup for Briggs ’08.  Four of the artists who will be performing on the Back Porch Stage are LONNIE SHIELDS, MIKEY JR., DONOVAN ROBERTS, and

MARK ARMSTRONG, other artists are still under consideration.  The Back Porch Stage will be tied into a village of vendors, our fresh roast sweet corn, and Mississippi Delta Style slow smoked meats.  Blues superstar LONNIE SHIELDS will be personally cooking it up for you in the Back Porch Village.  We’re talking about ribs, pulled pork, sausage, chicken and a real live crawfish boil.  Lonnie will be slathering on his “Lick the Bone” barbeque sauce and says, “You don’t need no teeth to eat my meat.”  Lonnie loves to barbeque!  

 

3-15-08-Every year Briggs Farm Blues Festival has been increasing in audience support by around 20% and this year our records already show an 80% increase in ticket sales at this point over last year.  As soon as the ground thaws and the mud season is over we will be extending our parking and camping areas.  Now is a good time to talk to your friends about joining you at a campsite at our festival so you can take advantage of the extra early discount rate, deadline May 11.  See Ticket page.

                

3-7-08 – We have been getting a number of comments from people as they start thinking about this year’s blues festival.  One comment we wanted to share with you was that “Briggs Farm has a unique sound and style and that this year’s line-up is no exception.”  That sound and style has been developing over the past 11 years. Selection of bands comes from; our trips to the Mississippi Delta, input from our audience and friends in the industry, and basic gut instinct.  A lot of that music comes from Deep South Delta Hill-country sound.  That music has a direct line from the early connections to blues music and plantation life.  Blues is a living art form that is always developing and changing.  Blues artists in any one performance may do a mixture of what they call straight ahead blues, soul, gospel, funk, rock, country blues or Chicago style blues.  One thing we love to do each year is to bring in a couple of the old school guys to share some of their stories with us.  Big George Brock, 75 years young, started blowing harp at age 8 is a genuine bluesman from the old days performing Saturday night on the main stage at Briggs Farm!                    

 

3-2-08- Hopefully this will be the last we see of the snow at Briggs Farm and spring is right around the corner.  As usual we are making plans to head down to the Juke Joint Festival in Clarksdale, Mississippi in April.  Among the acts playing at over a dozen Juke Joints around town we expect to see Johnny Rawls and Big George Brock who will be playing at Briggs this year.  We are already starting to receive ticket orders for the 2008 Festival.  It’s always nice to hear from our loyal supporters this time of year.

            

2-22-08-The Blues Music Awards are universally recognized as the highest honor given to Blues artists.  Nora Jean Bruso and Big George Brock, our Friday and Saturday night headliners have both been nominated this year.  Nora Jean Bruso for Traditional Blues Artist of the year and Big George Brock for Traditional Blues Album of the Year.  The 29th Blues Music Awards formally W.C.Handy Awards will be announced on May 8th in Tunica, Mississippi.  Check out this year’s main stage artists on our line-up page with  performance videos, as well as photos and sound samples of each artist.  After 67 years of singing the blues and playing harmonica, 75 year old Brock is the blues.   Briggs Farm is very excited to have him headlining Saturday.

 

2/15/08 - The MAIN STAGE LINEUP is now COMPLETE with the addition of KELLY RICHEY and CLARENCE SPADY to the already (seriously smoken hot) blues fest lineup.  Picture yourself on the hill in front of the main stage at Briggs Farm with the snow, ice and winter cold of February long forgotten.   Kelly Richey, Bobby Kyle, Sarah Ayers, Colin John and Michael Hill, all playing for you:  Johnny Rawls and Clarence Spady serenading you through a beautiful sunset.  The stage lights brighten , (you have to get up and dance) and Nora Jean Bruso and Big George Brock take you into the night.  WARM THOUGHTS .  Check the lineup page for times, bios, and music samples coming soon.  TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW.

 

2/9/08 - THREE EXCITING INTERNATIONAL ACTS BOOKED FOR FRIDAY JULY 11.  The main stage line-up has made some major progress this week. NORA JEAN BRUSO, JOHNNY RAWLS, and THE BOBBY KYLE BAND have joined the 2008 line-up. Nora Jean is simply one of the very best blues vocalists there is. Born and raised in Mississippi she will be coming to Briggs Farm from Chicago. Johnny Rawls has appeared on the cover of Living Blues Magazine and has been nominated four times for Blues Music Awards (formerly the W.C.Handy Awards). Bobby, an outstanding guitarist, toured and recorded for 6 years with Eddie Kirkland and 7 years with Johnny Clyde Copeland. Complete info and music coming soon from all this year’s musicians.
TICKETS ARE NOW ON SALE. Take advantage of advance purchase prices and extra early camping discounts.

 

2/2/08 - New Additions to Saturday Night Lineupr  FRESH FOLK BLUES with COLIN JOHN & MICHAEL HILL. Michael, from Michael Hill’s Blues Mob, recognized as one of modern blues most talented song writers and guitarists” (Living Blues) and Colin you may remember from his performance with his band Colin John Band at Briggs Farm 2006. They will be playing together on the main stage at 6pm, Saturday July 12th. We are working hard toward finishing the 2008 line-up in the next 2 weeks. More to come in next Friday’s newsletter.

 

1/25/08 - Big Changes in Food offerings at Briggs Farm  People love the farm fresh roasted sweet corn we’ve been serving up for the last 10 years. Some say they would come just for the corn. It’s very good! In addition to that we will be serving up a Mississippi Delta Blues special menu of slow smoked meats and crawfish. The most fantastic news is Blues Super Star LONNIE SHIELDS will be personally cooking it for you. Lonnie will be slow smoking and slathering on his “Lick the Bone” barbeque sauce to ribs, pulled pork, sausage, chicken and a real live crawfish boil. You can still bring your coolers but don’t bother bringing food 'cause as Lonnie says, “You don’t need no teeth to eat my meat.” Lonnie will also be “smok'n” with his guitar on the Back Porch Stage throughout the weekend Blues Festival. Lonnie loves to cook!

 

1/18/08 - SATURDAY HEADLINER BOOKED!   We have selected our first band for the 2008 Blues Festival and are thrilled to announce that the Saturday July 12th headliner is Big George Brock.   Son of a sharecropper from Grenada, Mississippi, 75 year old Big George is a stand out blues performer with a Deep South voice and a huge harmonica sound that takes you back to the way blues used to be played in the Mississippi Delta juke joints.  Look for a complete bio, music samples and video of Big George Brock on our lineup page soon.  That's all the line up we can let you in on just yet but several very exciting names are being considered for the main stage and acoustic stage.

 

1/18/08 - New RSS Feed for Briggs Fest 08  Click the orange button in the upper right hand corner of our site to subscribe to our new RSS feed. An RSS feed is a simple way for you to stay in touch with what is happening at Briggs Farm Blues Festival. Whenever we post an update your web browser will let you know there is an update to the site. Usually you will see a number or symbol appear next to the bookmark created when you click on the orange button. RSS feeds are very common on blogs and newssites such as CNN. Learn more about RSS by clicking here.

 

1/7/08 - RSS Newsr 

Briggs Farm has added an RSS feed to our festival this year. RSS stands for really simple syndication and is a way to stay up to date with announcements as we make them without having to re-visit the site to find out what has changed. Read more about

All browsers have a RSS reader built in to link to it just click the orange button in the upper right hand corner of the page or next to the address in the bar at the top.

Once you click the button it will ask you to save it similiar to a bookmark. Then when there is updated news your browser will show you there's a headline next to the bookmark title.

RSS here: http://www.whatisrss.com/

 

1/5/08 -Briggs Farm RSS Feed  The Briggs Farm RSS Feed is a place where we will be able to let you know about updates as soon as we know about them. Save yourself having to always check back into our site and just let the RSS feed subscription keep you up to date.

 

1/2/08 - Happy New Year  Exciting new changes and line up coming soon.