The Blues for Eric project has hosted almost a dozen benefit concerts at The Oaks featuring local blues and jazz musicians. On Saturday, November 2 Patrick Boyle and the UVic Jazz and Creative Music Ensemble will perform another benefit concert in the intimate, Oak Bay Village venue.
Blues for Eric is an ongoing benefit show in memory of Eric LeBlanc, who was a host for 33 years of CFUV radio’s Let the Good Times Roll, a weekly program dedicated to celebrating the blues. LeBlanc dearly loved jazz, and would love the Newfoundland-born Boyle’s bluesy interpretations of the improvisational art.
LeBlanc would also love the fact that the UVic Jazz and Creative Music Ensemble is a student group who will benefit from the memorial scholarship in his name, and that they will be performing at The Oaks to complete the projected $25 000 goal of the Blues for Eric project.
Boyle, a talented trumpet player and jazz guitarist, heads the Jazz Studies department at UVic’s School of Music. Previously, Boyle led a veteran band at The Oaks in a celebration of the music of Louis Armstrong to benefit the Blues for Eric campaign and raise funds for the Eric LeBlanc Memorial Scholarship — an annual scholarship for a UVic Music student in jazz studies.
Last year at UVic, Boyle’s trumpet was featured in concerts celebrating the music of Chet Baker and his UVic Ensemble’s original soundtrack for the classic silent film Potemkin. His latest CD covers tunes written by Bob Dylan, Michel Legrand and William Walton as well as his own original title track, After Forgetting.
The Nov. 2 show starts at 7 p.m., but fans of earlier Blues for Eric benefit concerts at The Oaks have been coming early for meals, drinks, and a good seat. There are no reserved seats, so come early with cash to get your $20 tickets in advance and have a great time enjoying music from a highly-recommended jazz player and his students.
For more information on Blues for Eric, call (250) 590-3155.
