3 Modern Blues Musicians Who Are Keeping the Genre Alive

The blues genre has never been totally obsolete. However, in the ever-changing music industry, the genre has seemingly taken a back seat in favor of other types of music. It’s a shame, but it is currently the way the cookie has been crumbling. However, there are a few modern musicians of current prominence whose main genre is the Mississippi-born music class of the blues.

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Now, do they play other genres? Of course! That being said, the musicians in question pride themselves on being proprietors and preservers of the modernized form. Let’s take a look at three modern blues musicians who are stunning fans and keeping the age-old genre alive.

Derek Trucks

Derek Trucks has always been known as a guitar savant. Ever since he started playing with The Allman Brothers Band at 19 years old, Trucks has been playing the blues arguably better than some of the greats. He continued doing so with The Derek Trucks Band and by playing with The Tedeschi Trucks Band alongside his wife, Susan Tedeschi.

Some of the songs that prove how well Trucks has kept the genre alive include “D Minor Blues”, “Midnight in Harlem”, and “The Sky is Crying”. Trucks’ talent on the guitar is not only a testament articulating him as one of the best of all time, but it is also evidence that his blues guitar skills rival that of Stevie Ray Vaughan, B.B. King, and Muddy Waters. Though, that’s definitely debatable.

Marcus King

The moment that made Marcus King a contemporary blues legend was in 2014 when he played “Driftin’ Blues” at Norman’s Rare Guitars in Los Angeles. The moment garnered him both attention and respect from the community, as his performance planted him as one of the best blues guitarists of the 21st century.

Thanks to how viral that YouTube video went, King went on to release his first solo album, El Dorado. He received a Grammy Nomination in 2020 for Best Americana Album for that very record. The man has a plethora of notable blues songs and performances under his belt, including “Blues Worse Than I Ever Had” and “Beautiful Stranger”.

Gary Clark Jr.

Even though Gary Clark Jr. is awfully experimental with the blues, at his core, he is an impeccable blues guitarist. In his incredibly diverse catalog, songs that ring out as “pure” blues include “Don’t Owe You A Thang” and “Catfish Blues”. The man has four Grammys and wrote a cover of The Beatles’, “Come Together” for the 2017 Justice League movie, too. That rendition of the Fab Four classic has an undeniably heavy blues undertone.

Regardless of his experimental ways, Clark is a blues musician. Clark is one of the few remaining modern blues musicians currently on the scene who utilize the musical category in a nuanced and original fashion, all while paying homage to the old guard.

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