Jay Shogren and the Shanghai’d were selected by the Wyoming Blues and Jazz Society to represent Wyoming at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis, Tenn. Jan. 30 through Feb. 2.
“Memphis is a great music town,” Shogren, vocalist, guitarist, mandolin player and songwriter for the band, said. “It should be a great experience and good for the band. We don’t usually see ourselves in competitions, but it will be a unique opportunity to represent Wyoming.”
The Shanghai’d were in Saratoga last June as the opening act for Jalan Crossland at the Hi-Water Hoedown at the Yard.
To help the band get to and from Memphis, Toga Productions is teaming up with the Wolf Hotel to provide a fundraiser show Jan. 12 from 8 to 11 p.m.
The Wolf will be serving a BBQ brisket dinner special and is contributing 15 percent of dinner proceeds to the Memphis fund.
Bands can represent a state at the Blues Challenge twice. The Cheyenne-based blues band, Another Kind of Magick, went to Memphis the previous two years.
Shogren has been to Memphis once before when he went on a pilgrimage with his son and took in Graceland, Sun Records, and looped down to Tupelo, Miss.
The band usually plays gigs in Wyoming and Colorado and this trip will give them a chance to stretch out geographically. In May, they plan to widen their loop in the Rockies by circling around to Montana, Idaho, Utah, and Nebraska.
They will return to Saratoga this summer along with Jalan Crossland and a Jackson-based band Screen Door Porch for an Americana-themed show.
“We’ve always enjoyed playing in Saratoga,” Shogren said. “People there have always been receptive.”
The band writes their own songs and has recorded four albums with original material.
Shogren describes the Shanghai’d’s music as Wyoming mountain blues, not like roadhouse or Chicago style blues.
“We use the same sort of themes,” Shogren said, “it’s just blues before electricity.”
I always believed blues are about challenges between men and women and how you express it - that’s what we cover and how we express it.”
The band members all have day jobs associated with education - three work at the University of Wyoming and one works at the Albany County School district.
Through his musical work and life, Shogren has made only one discovery about his source of blues material - the challenges between men and women.
“(I’ve rediscovered) there are some depths that just persist,” Shogren said. “There is always a lot to think about when you are in that territory.”
Reader Comments(0)