Regional IBC, November 2009: Part 2
Facts
- The IBC judges acts on a ten-point scale across five categories: Blues Content, Originality, Vocals, Instrumental Talent, and Stage Presence (Blues Foundation official rules).
- An act cannot enter the IBC directly; it must be sponsored by a Blues Foundation-affiliated local or regional blues society (Blues Foundation official rules).
- The Southern California Blues Society was a real Blues Foundation affiliate; its sponsored act, Zac Harmon and the Mid-South Blues Revue, won the "Best Unsigned Band" title at the 2004 IBC in Memphis (Wikipedia: Zac Harmon).
- The IBC finals take place annually in Memphis, Tennessee, centered on Beale Street (Blues Foundation; Treasure Coast Blues Society IBC instructions).
This page documents the second part of a photo gallery the original Southern California Blues Society site published after a Regional International Blues Challenge (IBC) qualifying round held in November 2009. Here is what this kind of event actually was and why it mattered to the local scene.
The International Blues Challenge is the Blues Foundation's annual band competition, culminating each year in Memphis, Tennessee, centered on Beale Street. Acts cannot enter the IBC directly; they have to be sponsored by a Blues Foundation-affiliated blues society, which runs its own local or regional qualifying round first. The Southern California Blues Society was one of those affiliates, and a November 2009 "Regional IBC" round, like the one this gallery documented, would have been exactly that kind of local qualifier: unsigned or semi-pro bands playing short sets in front of judges, competing for the chance to represent the region in Memphis the following January.
The judging format itself is well documented by the Blues Foundation. Panels of three judges, drawn from blues professionals and dedicated fans, score each act on a ten-point scale across five categories: Blues Content, Originality, Vocals, Instrumental Talent, and Stage Presence. Blues Content and Originality reward a band's grounding in blues tradition balanced against fresh material or arrangements; Vocals and Instrumental Talent assess technical and expressive performance; Stage Presence covers how an act commands and connects with a room.
The Blues Foundation formally split IBC competitors into separate Band and Solo/Duo categories in 2002, recognizing that a full electric band and a single acoustic performer were competing under meaningfully different conditions even when judged on the same five-category rubric. That distinction would have applied to whatever acts SCBS sent through its regional rounds in this era, since a society sponsoring both a band act and a solo or duo act in the same year became common practice once the two tracks existed separately, effectively doubling a given affiliate's chances of sending someone to Memphis.
The first part of this gallery covers the earlier heats of the same event; the following year's round is covered at Regional IBC, November 2010. Surviving photographic material from this kind of SCBS gallery is collected on our photos page.
