The Blues in Hell Festival has been a yearly tradition for me since the mid 90’s. The festival is held at Hell, a small place by the airport outside of Trondheim, Norway, and except for three years when it was called Hell Music Fest and the repertoar was pop/rock/hip hop, the festival has been true to the blues roots all the time. Being a smaller festival, they have also presented interesting and great artists a bit outside of the most commercial ones. (Photo above: The winner of the Blues in Hell Award, Jan Erik Moe)
Friday at Blues in Hell – Adam Douglas, Nick Moss, Reidar Larsen & The Storytellers and excellent young bands
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The 31st edition of the Notodden Blues Festival ended on Sunday. It has been a long weekend with music from early in the day until 2 AM, and a lot of friendly and smiling blues fans all around town. This year Ry Cooder was the biggest name together with Bonnie Raitt, and then a lot of other great artists after these two. Here are my photos from the festival. (Photo above: Ty Taylor from Vintage Trouble)
Beth Hart’s breakthrough as an artist came in 1999. In 2003 she released the platinum selling album Leave The Light On. From there her career has gone steadily upwards, culminating with a Grammy nomination for her collaboration with Joe Bonamassa and the album 
The first time I saw Jonny Lang was at Antone’s in Austin during SXSW around 2000, and then at the big outdoor venue Stubb’s during the same event in 2002. By that time he had had one #1 Billboard album, one Grammy nomination and had released three albums before he turned twenty. This week he played at John Dee, fifteen years after I saw him the last time.
The Blues in Hell festival has been arranged for some twenty years and is still going strong. Situated in a congress hotell close to the Trondheim airport at the place that actually is called Hell, it is a festival that celebrated both the original blues and also newer variation of blue and blues rock. Here are my photos of the artists I saw at Hell this weekend. (Photo above: The Original Blues Brothers Band)
This year is the 30th Notodden Blues Festival, and it is good to be back. The festival has grown from a small and enthusiastic happening to become Norway’s largest blues festival, and also one of the best blues festivals in the world. This year is no exception, and here are photos of the artists from the first night. (Photo above: students from Little Steven’s Blues School)
Artist Pictures Blog 