Debuting in 1973, the San Francisco Blues Festival is the longest running blues festival in the United States. Tom Mazzolini, the event's producer, founded the blues festival to educate the public about the history and evolution of the blues. Many of the performers at the early concerts were the pioneers and originators of the West Coast blues sound.
In 2009, Mazzolini announced that after 37 consecutive years, the festival was forced to cease production due to economic reasons.
Read more about San Francisco Blues Festival: Notable Performers By Year
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—Maya Angelou (b. 1928)
“We had won. Pimps got out of their polished cars and walked the streets of San Francisco only a little uneasy at the unusual exercise. Gamblers, ignoring their sensitive fingers, shook hands with shoeshine boys.... Beauticians spoke to the shipyard workers, who in turn spoke to the easy ladies.... I thought if war did not include killing, I’d like to see one every year. Something like a festival.”
—Maya Angelou (b. 1928)
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—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)
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—Rosetta Reitz, U.S. author. As quoted in The Political Palate, ch. 10, by Betsey Beaven et al. (1980)
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—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)