Blues in New Zealand

The history of blues in New Zealand dates from the 1960s. The earliest blues influences on New Zealand musicians were indirect — not from the United States but from white British blues musicians: first the R&B styles of The Animals and The Rolling Stones, and later the blues-tinged rock of groups such as Led Zeppelin. The first American blues artist to make a big impact in New Zealand was Stevie Ray Vaughan in the early 1980s. Other blues-related genres such as soul and gospel almost completely by-passed New Zealand audiences, except for a handful of hits from cross-over artists such as Ray Charles.

Artists

Midge Marsden

Midge Marsden is a blues and R&B guitarist, harmonica-player and singer with a career spanning four decades.

Darren Watson

Darren Watson is a singer and guitarist in a wide range of blues styles, as well as an international award-winning songwriter. Watson led the very popular blues band Smoke Shop, which featured on the New Zealand charts and toured extensively throughout the country in the 1980s and 1990s, opening for several international blues artists including NZ tours with Koko Taylor, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, and two tours with The Robert Cray Band. More recently Watson has recorded three successful albums: King Size, which was nominated for Best Roots Album at the 2003 NZ Music Awards, 2005's South Pacific Soul, and his latest Saint Hilda's Faithless Boy, which Wellington's Dominion Post named in their Top 5 albums of 2010. And was recently favourably reviewed in prestigious US publication Blues Revue.

Hammond

Hammond may refer to:

People

Places

Canada

United States of America

Hammond station (Louisiana)

Hammond is an Amtrak train station in Hammond, Louisiana, United States. It is a station on Amtrak's daily City of New Orleans route which runs between Chicago and New Orleans. The Illinois Central Railroad built the station in 1912. A freight station was built in Hammond in 1927 a few blocks south; however this station is no longer active except as a flea market and seafood restaurant.

Known locally as the Depot, Hammond's historic Amtrak station has been refurbished with a raised passenger platform. The railway, constructed in 1854 as part of the New Orleans, Jackson and Great Northern railroad, is now owned by the Canadian National Railway. Renovated in 2008, the depot also houses the Hammond Chamber of Commerce. The architectural firm Holly & Smith received the 2008 American Institute of Architects' New Orleans Award of Merit for Historic Preservation/Restoration/Rehabilitation for its work on the station.

Amtrak provides both ticketing and baggage services at the Hammond station.

Hammond, Louisiana

Hammond is the largest city in Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana, United States. It is forty-five miles east of Baton Rouge. The population was 20,019 in the 2010 census and is home to Southeastern Louisiana University. Hammond is the principal city of the Hammond Micropolitan Statistical Area, which includes all of Tangipahoa Parish.

History

19th century

The city is named for Peter Hammond (1798–1870) — the surname anglicized from Peter av Hammerdal (Peter of Hammerdal) — a Swedish immigrant who first settled the area around 1818. Peter, a sailor, had been briefly imprisoned by the British at Dartmoor Prison during the Napoleonic Wars. He escaped during a prison riot, made his way back to sea, and later on arrived in New Orleans. Hammond used his savings to buy then-inexpensive land northwest of Lake Pontchartrain. There he started a plantation to cultivate trees, which he made into masts, charcoal, and other products for the maritime industry in New Orleans. He transported the goods by oxcart to the head of navigation on the Natalbany River at Springfield. He owned at least thirty slaves before the Civil War. Peter Hammond lost his wealth during the war, as Union soldiers raided his property.