When The Bus Breaks

Linda Burton posting from Helena, Montana – “Our bus broke down in Cheyenne,” she explained. “It was something about the compressor, and my husband drove to Denver to get the part. They didn’t have it either.” So Rory Block got to Helena by renting a car and driving 700 miles to sing for us tonight. “I kind of got into the groove for that Montana speed limit,” she confessed. Rory Block is sitting mid-stage in the Myrna Loy Center and I’m sitting 40 feet away in Seat #2, with a straight-line unobstructed view. She’d walked onstage precisely at 8 PM, a long, tall drink of water, in long legged slender slacks, long blond hair brushing the center of her back, some sparkly bracelets her only flash. This 5-time Blues Award Winner, heralded as “a living landmark,” “a national treasure” and “one of the greatest living acoustic blues artists” was here with us now, chatting to the house of 250 as though we were sharing our living room. The New York Times once declared of Rory “her playing is perfect, her singing otherworldly as she wrestles with ghosts, shadows and legends.” The evening took it one step more; she manages finicky sound systems and broken down buses with equal aplomb. » read more