Walking On Fire [CD]

Since the release of his debut album, Big New From Baton Rouge!!, in 1988, Kenny Neal has gone from being a word-of-mouth Deep South cult figure to becoming one of the most popular young bluesmen in the country. He's toured all over the U.S. and Canada, playing most of the major blues festivals: The Chicago Blues Festival; The King Biscuit Festival; The Motor City Blues Festival; The Beale Street Festival; The River Walk Festival, and for four years in a row, The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Plus, he's played literally hundreds of club dates including a two-month 1990 tour with Lucky Peterson and Silent Partners. He's already toured Europe twice, appearing on German network TV and headlining The Amsterdam Blues Festival.

Now, Kenny has taken a giant step forward for his career and for the blues. In February of 1991, Kenny opened as the star of a Broadway musical play, "Mule Bone," a "lost" play written by the famed African-American poet Langston Hughes and folklorist Zora Neale Hurston in 1930 and rediscovered a few years ago. The music for "Mule Bone" was written by blues legend Taj Mahal. As a tribute to Hughes, Kenny has set two Hughes poems to music for Walking On Fire . On these songs, Kenny played both harmonica and acoustic guitar.

For the remainder of the album, Kenny was joined by some of the finest players in the blues and R&B realm. He's accompanied on most of the tunes by the famed rhythm team, Silent Partners. The horns are played by the legendary veterans of the James Brown Orchestra, the Horny Horns: Fred Wesley on trombone and Maceo Parkeron alto sax. Fred and Maceo are joined by members of the King Snake Horns and Kenny's touring horn player, Danny Fields. As on Kenny's previous albums, all the keyboards are played by Kenny's label mate, the amazing Lucky Peterson.

Ever since his childhood, when Kenny began learning the blues from his father, the Baton Rouge bluesman Raful Neal, and through his years of studying under Slim Harpo, Lazy Lester and Buddy Guy, Kenny has been destined to be one of the major bluesmen of his generation. With years on the road, a Broadway play, and now the third album of his career, Kenny Neal is on his way to fulfilling his destiny.

-- Bruce Iglauer