{"id":1542,"date":"2021-10-20T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-20T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sofarsoundsblo.wpengine.com\/blog\/articles\/black-history-month-community-spotlight-the-blues\/"},"modified":"2024-06-06T17:00:53","modified_gmt":"2024-06-06T17:00:53","slug":"black-history-month-spotlight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/articles\/black-history-month-spotlight","title":{"rendered":"Black History Month Community Spotlight: The Blues Project and BLUES100"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As we all step out of a tough stretch of isolated months, we\u2019re fortunate to have supportive communities out there, ready to take us in and help us thrive. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/articles\/black-history-month-2021\">This Black History Month<\/a>, community is the focus. That\u2019s what <a href=\"https:\/\/thebluesproject.co\/blues100\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Blues Project<\/a> (and BLUES100) is all about\u2013 serving as a community resource, uplifting wildly talented artists throughout the UK who perform variations of soul, neo-jazz, and R&amp;B.<\/p>\n<p>The collective didn\u2019t start as a response to the pandemic though\u2013 it was already clear back in 2016 to founder Simi Agbaje that the need to support these artists, primarily Black artists, was there. \u201cAt the time I just didn\u2019t see the music I liked being represented well,\u201d says Agbaje. \u201cAs someone who\u2019s a fan of those genres I found it really hard to find the kind of music I liked, and the few platforms that did exist weren\u2019t representing the talent in a way that was matching the level of creativity that they were putting into their music. It just didn\u2019t have\u2013 I hate to say \u201ccool factor,\u201d but cool in the sense of being creative, pulling people in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So, The Blues Project was born. The collective supports artists in multiple ways\u2013 hosting unique performances (or Cyphers), keeping a strong social media presence, and utilizing a membership service for listeners to discover and support artists directly, starting at \u00a32 a month. \u201cThe average music listener, or even the average music lover, isn\u2019t going to go hunting, so you have to present things in a way that has a certain level of appeal and ease of engaging with,\u201d says Agbaje.<\/p>\n<p>Of course the biggest focus remains the music itself. The Blues Project works to make that resonate in its own way as well, creating distinctive environments for each live performance. \u201cWe don\u2019t want it to be like an experience you\u2019ve had before at a gig,\u201d says Agbaje. \u201cWe just find ways to make it a more immersive experience and bring that communal and collective effort feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>More recently the collective started BLUES100, highlighting 100 artists, giving extra visibility to raise awareness, and bringing more financial opportunities, including partnering with brands, organizations, along with direct support from the collective memberships. There\u2019s even a collaboration with AWAL on the horizon for a release of BLUES100 original music. BLUES100 shares only a handful of artists at a time via \u201cseasons,\u201d and launched the second season line-up back in August, featuring artists like Sofar alum <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Jr9TJohFRtE\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mali Hayes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDiscovery is still a challenge, but it\u2019s not the biggest challenge for artists&#8230; it\u2019s more about those artists being fairly compensated for the great music they\u2019re making, and particularly black talent,\u201d says Agbaje. \u201cIt\u2019s really apparent to me and the team that they\u2019re just not getting the kind of opportunities that create income from their music, so we created the BLUES100 as a kind of answer to that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/1665185578featuredimage.avif\" \/><span class=\"sc-kpOJdX jVJdyv\">Simi Agbaje, Founder of The Blues Project<\/span><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a lot of irons in the fire for the collective, but it\u2019s been paying off\u2013\u00a0artists from The Blues Project have landed agents, been featured by platforms like COLORS, and have even secured grants from the PRS foundation.<\/p>\n<p>Curious how you can get on The Blues Project\u2019s radar? \u201cIt\u2019s ultimately us being immersed in this community,\u201d Agbaje says. \u201cThe music industry is really small, all of the artists know each other, like one degree of separation. They\u2019re always sharing or talking about their peers [on social media]. I think that\u2019s one of the great things about this space of music, that because it is fairly underground, it is quite a supportive culture.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Wondering how you can support The Blues Project? Check out <a href=\"https:\/\/thebluesproject.co\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">their website<\/a> for details on memberships, mailing lists, social media, and of course, ways to listen to the wonderful artist collective.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/lists\/black-voices\">And check out shows from Black Artists happening near you this Black History Month!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As we all step out of a tough stretch of isolated months, we\u2019re fortunate to have supportive communities out there, ready to take us in and help us thrive. This Black History Month, community is the focus. That\u2019s what The Blues Project (and BLUES100) is all about\u2013 serving as a community resource, uplifting wildly talented [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1543,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,26],"tags":[160],"class_list":["post-1542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","category-news","tag-black-history-month"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}