-- About Us --
Jeff Horton (Contact Jeff at bluesviews at tx.rr.com)
Photo of Jimmie Vaughan and Jeff © 2001 by Robin Horton
I started out in blues photography in 2001 with an Olympus point and click. I had been a casual photographer since childhood but never studied it or even considered it a real hobby. I had always liked the blues even though I didn't know much about it, and my exposure to the blues throughout most of my life was limited to the Allman Brothers, Led Zeppelin and similar groups that picked up the blues and ran with it.
My wife Robin bought the Olympus in 2000 and I began using it around the house. In 2001, I met a fellow Stevie Ray Vaughan fan and music photographer named Scott Springfield, from Norman, Oklahoma. Scott got me out of the house and into a couple of Dallas blues shows and the Oklahoma Blues Festival in Tulsa. I took the camera along, and I was hooked when I saw the results. Looking back at those photos now, they aren't very good, but I was excited by them at the time.
In May of 2001 a local Dallas blues lover, Michael Schaefer, started a Yahoo group called North Texas Blues and invited me to join. Soon Robin and I were going to one blues show after another and we began meeting other people involved in the Dallas-Fort Worth blues scene. After a couple of years my technique improved as I took more interest in photographing the performers who had become our friends. In May of 2004 I took the plunge into the digital SLR world and greatly expanded what I could do with modern digital camera equipment and software. By 2005 I had taken so many shots I decided to put up a website to display them.
The best thing that has happened to me since I became a devotee of live blues is that I've made friends, met people and traveled to places I otherwise never would have. I've had the privelege to meet such great artists as B.B. King, Robert Lockwood, Jr., Pinetop Perkins, Little Milton, Jimmie Vaughan and a host of others. And I have forged some close and long-lasting friendships with numerous artists and fellow fans here in Dallas. None of that would have happened if it wasn't for Scott and Michael giving me the impetus to get off my butt and into the blues shows.
My greatest experience in the blues has been getting to know the great Mississippi bluesman, Sam Myers. I have taken more photos of Sam than anyone else, as visitors to this website will see if they go through it thoroughly. Sam and I became good friends to such an extent that I was inspired by Robin to work with Sam in writing his autobiography, "Sam Myers: The Blues Is My Story." It was published in October, 2006, by the University Press of Mississippi. But sadly, Sam passed away in July of 2006 and never got to see his book in print.
Now I am filling up the galleries a year at a time, working backwards now from 2003 while keeping current with 2007. I hope you enjoy looking at our photos of blues musicians as much as we have enjoyed the experience of attending the shows and festivals where we shot them. I have continued to learn as much as I can about the blues, being aware that it is a subject that one could study for a lifetime and still not cover it all. I appreciate my blues experience more than I can describe in words, and I'm very thankful that my life chanced to take me down this path.
I also want to thank some notable blues photographers for their friendship, advice and encouragment: Scott Allen (vividpix.com), Mark "Dusty" Scott (dustyblues.com) and Chuck Winans (pipphotgraphy.com).
I created this website using Dreamweaver MX 2004 to build the pages and Breezebrowser Pro 1.3 to build the galleries. This is my first effort at building a website, so expect to see continuous improvement as my knowledge and skill level grows.
Robin Horton
2001 was a pivotal year for us. Jeff and I started going to see local musicians and I thought it would be fun to take a few pictures. Little did I know that those few pictures would change our lives.
I was extremely fortunate that Magic Slim and the Teardrops came to play at J&J Blues Bar in Fort Worth in the spring of 2001. We arrived early and had front row seats. The band began to play and I was immediately mesmermized by the words and sound of the music. Until that time I had not realized how universal the blues could be. Here was an older man from Chicago singing about the events of my life. My eyes misted a little and then a lot and I started crying. Magic Slim noticed the tears and walked down from the stage and stood at our table. He stayed there for the rest of the song and nodded a subtle goodbye when he returned to the stage. Magic Slim touched my soul that night and I have never listened to music or the blues in the same way since.
Jeff is right about the first pictures. I wanted to put a picture from that magical night with this article and all of them were terrible! We have both improved, especially Jeff. He has made a priority to learn all he can about live music photography. I still use a point and shoot and my pictures show it. I intend to learn how to use the Canon DSLR and buy one of my own soon.
Please support your local blues by attending live shows whenever you can. Listening to live music in an intimate environment is an incredible experience.
The Artists
Since we live in North Texas, most of the shots you will see will be of musicians from Dallas and Fort Worth. We have a very active blues scene here, but for some reason, we don't get the steady stream of nationally known blues artists that other cities enjoy. So if some of the names and faces are unfamiliar to you, rest assured that they are performing the blues at a very high level indeed.
Gear
I started out in digital SLR photography with the Canon 300D. From there I went to the 30D, then the 40D and now use the 50D. I currently use these lenses (all Canon glass): 70-300mm f/ 4-5.6 IS, 70-200mm f/2.8 L IS, 24-70mm f/2.8 L, 85mm f/1.2 L, 50mm f/1.4, and 35mm f/1.4 L. I've used a 1.4x extender a few times with good results.
Technique
I shoot performances using available light almost exclusively. Looking back, I must have been a real pest to my fellow audience members when I was using the flash on my Olympus a couple of dozen times a night.
I prefer to show a performer as the audience sees him or her in the light that the stage is projecting at the time of the shot. To me, using a flash seems to make the image more sterile. Interesting effects abound when using only the stage lights or natural light for illumination. You can look here for an example of what I'm talking about.
I always shoot in manual mode and almost always select the RAW format. I'll start out the evening at an ISO that will allow a shutter speed of 100-125 with my aperture stopped down two f-stops. I'll check the results of my first few shots with the LCD display, look at the histogram and adjust accordingly. From then on, it's down to positioning myself, knowing the artist's moves and tendencies, watching the changing light and trusting to luck to get a few good shots by the end of the night.
Filter, or not to Filter?
There's a fair amount of disagreement whether it's good to use a clear filter on your lens for protection. I decided to see for myself with a little test that you can read about here.
Workflow
Since I almost always shoot in RAW format, my workflow typically goes like this: RAW > TIFF processed with Lightroom 1.1, then TIFF > JPEG with Photoshop CS4. I use two add-on programs for additional post-processing and cleanup when needed: Topaz Labs DeNoise 2 for excessive diginoise and Acclaim Focus Magic 3.01 for those extra specks that sometimes show up when shooting in the dark.
Problem images occur frequently in music photography. Stage equipment such as microphones and their stands can be a real headache, spoiling what otherwise would have been a perfectly good shot. Fortunately, with the miracle of Photoshop, good things can be made to happen.
Published Work
I'm very grateful to Dusty Scott for recommending me to Blues Revue magazine and to Editor Ken Bays for publishing my photos of Gary Clark Jr., Joe Bonamassa and Sam Myers. May there be many more to follow. Thanks also to Bernard Monnot of the French quarterly Blues Magazine for using a number of my photos of Robert Lockwood, Jr. for a tribute article to the late blues master. I've also contributed many times to Dallas' own Southwest Blues magazine, courtesy of my friend Joanna Iz, editor and publisher.
The Cover That Wasn't
In 2007 my shot of Johnny Winter from his appearance at the Granada in Dallas back in 2005 almost made the cover of Blues Revue magazine. Here's what the second-place finisher would've looked like on the newsstand:
CD Artwork
It has been our great pleasure to provide photos to several of our musician friends for their CD artwork:
Robin Bank$ CD, "Live After Dark" (2002) Inside
Robin Bank$ CD, "Live After Dark" (2002) Back
Trainreck CD, "There's A Trainreck Comin'" (2002) Back
K.M. Williams CD, "Blind Willie's Hymns" (2002) Front
K.M. Williams CD, "I'm An Old Soul" (2003) Front
K.M. Williams CD, "I'm An Old Soul" (2003) Inside
K.M. Williams CD, "I'm An Old Soul" (2003) Back
Joe Jonas CD, "Me, Myself and I" (2005) Front
Joe Jonas CD, "Me, Myself and I" (2005) Disc
Joe Jonas CD, "Me, Myself and I" (2005) Back
