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Blues Project, The

Formed in 1965, The Blues Project were in the vanguard of the Sixties blues revival. Playing a rootsy amalgam of blues, jazz, folk and rock, they were a mainstay at the Cafe Au Go Go in Greenwich Village, New York.

With such FM classics as Flute Thing, they also helped lay the foundations for prog rock.

Guitarist Danny Kalb and drummer Roy Blumenfeld, both from upstate New York, met guitarist Steve Katz and bassist/flautist Andy Kulberg on the Village coffeehouse circuit.

They grabbed Al Kooper just after the hot songwriter (This Diamond Ring) and session guitarist had played organ on Bob Dylan‘s Like A Rolling Stone. For a short time, folk singer Tommy Flanders was also a member.

The Blues Project improvised brilliantly onstage, but squabbling impeded the band’s songwriting (despite one excellent studio album, Projections).

Kalb left in 1967 after a bad LSD trip, and Kooper soon followed, forming Blood, Sweat and Tears in 1968.

Kooper also produced records for such acts as Lynyrd Skynyrd and The Tubes, cut numerous solo albums, and played on records by Jimi Hendrix and The Rolling Stones.

Kalb overcame emotional problems and drugs to guide The Blues Project through another incarnation in the early Seventies. A later Blues Project lineup evolved into Seatrain. Blumenfeld left that outfit after one album and worked as a lumberjack before returning to music.