LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa.– Curator, promoter and area native, Richard Ruoff launches his fifth annual Lancaster Roots & Blues Festival March 9th, 10th & 11th, 2018. The festival kicks off Friday evening and the Lancaster County Convention Center will serve as the festival’s main stage alongside local favorites 26 East at Altana, Chameleon Club, Tellus 360, The Elks Lodge, The Sugar Tank, The Village Nightclub and ZoeTropolis.
Ruoff cheers, “Lancaster Roots and Blues is heading into our fifth year of bringing fantastic music to beautiful downtown Lancaster for three days of fun. Featuring our best selection of music yet with Blues, Jazz, Rock and Rockabilly, Ska, Soul, Reggae, Celtic music and more. We have great bands and great fans from around the country to see and hear live music that will move your feet and your soul. Two new venues this year promises to make for an even better festival experience. I hope to see you all there.”
This year’s festival will highlight performances from JJ Grey & MoFro, Shemekia Copeland, Eric Johnson, Morgan James, NRBQ, Peterson Brothers, Tommy Conwell and the Young Rumblers, Samantha Fish, Johnny Nicholas, Kenny Neal, Lil’ Ed and The Blues Imperials, Magic Dick and Shun Ng, The Meditations, Clarence Spady, Ron Holloway Band, Vanessa Collier, Anthony Gomes, Bailey Fulginiti Trio, Billy Burnett, Billy Kemp, Blues on the Loose, Corsair Blues Jazz Orchestra, Corty Byron, Doug Deming & The Jewel Tones, Dr. Harmonica & Rockett 88, Gabe Stillman, Happy Sally, Linwood Taylor, Little Buddy, Little Leroys, Lowercase Blues Band, Mama Tried, Miss Melanie and the Valley Rats, Moe Blues Band, Phil Gammage, Ray Fuller & The Bluesrockers, Ray Owen, Rue de la Pompe, The Ardvark Felon, The Big Takeover, The Commonheart, The Probables, The Town Pants, The Trey Alexander Band, The Willie Miller Xperience with The Marblettes, Tommy Z, Ursula Ricks Project, and Vinegar Creek Constituency amongst others.
2018 marks the local promoter’s fifth annual foray into the Roots & Blues Festival. Concert promotion has been a part of Ruoff’s life as long as he can remember. He was the founder and owner of the Chameleon Club for seventeen years. After its sale and and the growth in arts and popular culture in Lancaster, Rich was inspired to resurrect the blues festivals he promoted in the mid-80s at the Chameleon. He hit the ground running in 2014 for a very successful festival drawing concert-goers from Lancaster, central PA, Harrisburg, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Delaware, New Jersey, New York and beyond.
But none of this was new to Ruoff, as a young boy in the 1960s, his parents were the proprietors of a nightclub called Hullaballoo – where many great musicians made stops in central PA on their way through the country. For Ruoff there was an excitement to bringing live music to Lancaster. What to do following graduation from McCaskey High School and some night classes at F&M seemed obvious as he opened the The Chameleon Club at local restaurant Tom Paine’s – bringing live and contemporary music to Lancaster.
The back room at the restaurant that housed the early Chameleon Club neatly segued into owning and operating the club at its current location. Flash forward to 2014 and Ruoff was ready to promote a festival celebrating his favorite style of music: blues.
Of the 2017 festival, Elmore Magazine raved, “although I never stopped moving and saw many performers, I wish I could have seen even more of the artists at Lancaster. Rich Ruoff and his staff put on an excellent, diverse roots and blues festival. The Lancaster Roots & Blues did their job in Saving American Music.”
This March 9th, 10th and 11th, Rich will bring all the things he loves about his hometown and music to the fifth annual Lancaster Roots & Blues Festival.
For more information and tickets, you can visit the Lancaster Roots & Blues Festival website here.
SOURCE: Lancaster Roots & Blues Festival
