| Date: | July 04, 2015 |
| Time: | 8:00 - 11:30 PM |
| Venue: | Dogtown Roadhouse |
| Cost: | $3.00 |
| Description: |
Dogtown Roadhouse celebrates the 4th of July featuring the music of Henry Street Blues on Saturday, July 4, 2015 starting at 8 pm. The Henry Street Blues Band hails from Roanoke, Virginia. During the segregationist era, Henry Street in the Gainsboro neighborhood served Roanoke’s African American community as a separate, self-sustaining business and cultural center. It contained many of the businesses necessary for the daily life and survival of the community. Perhaps the single most important place on Henry Street was the Hotel Dumas, where first-class overnight accommodations were provided for blacks traveling through and in the city for business, entertainment, educational or social purposes. When black musicians traveled to Roanoke to perform at the Hotel Roanoke or Star City American Legion Auditorium during segregation, they would be excluded from staying overnight anywhere except in the “colored” Hotel Dumas. The guest list of the Hotel Dumas during that period includes some of the greatest names in blues and jazz – Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Lena Horn, Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Ella Fitzgerald, and many others. After regular shows at the Hotel Roanoke, audiences, black and white together, ignoring the social conventions imposed upon them, would often accompany the performers back to the Hotel Dumas and other night spots on Henry Street for all-night jam sessions. Now as back then, music has the power to bring people together across racial, ethnic or other lines that too often separate. It is in that spirit that “Henry Street Blues” offers up its renderings of classic and new blues music. Blues with a purpose! Link: http://henrystreetblues.com/ All ages are welcome. For more information: For more information, visit: http://www.dogtownfloyd.com/ or https://www.facebook.com/DogtownRoadhouse or call 540-745-6836. |