Dave Ferguson

South African born Dave Ferguson has been playing harmonica since the age of 17. Apart from the regular Blues shows he does with two of the top Blues bands in Cape Town, he also guests with many other high profile Artists in South Africa, and has appeared on a number of commercial album releases, most notably the award winning "Vuur en Vlam" by Valiant Swart and Ollie Viljoen and "County Girl" by Cheree. His playing appears on the theme tune of a new M-Net TV mini series called "Innocent Times" and in addition 3 of his solo tunes are being used on the show as well as cameo appearances.

He have recently returned to South Africa after living and working in the UK for the last decade or so. Whilst in London he was fairly active as a blues and country player for both live and studio session work. Here is a short but not exhaustive list of some of the artists he's played or recorded with: Sophia, The Arlenes, Emily Barker, Mickey Harte (Irelands entry to the Eurovision Song Contest, the album went double platinum in Ireland and I appear on one track), Hucklebuck, John Townes Van Sandt, The Ian Siegel Band (sitting in for Lee Sankey), King Deluxe, Alva Skully, the London Street Blues Band, Dave Clarke's Blues of Cain and others.

His show which is getting a lot of good press lately and which is probably the best example of a showcase to promote the advancement of the harmonica, is developing very strongly and looks set to become his main performance focus.

This is a solo show using only harmonica, human beat-box and vocals, recording live loops and then layering and building those loops to construct a song. Nothing is pre-recorded so once a song is played it's gone... ya know "live". Doing a mixture of originals and some Blues/Americana numbers etc. Genre classification would have to be something like "Trance-Blues & Country-Dub".

Although it's a solo act it's not your typical singer-songwhiner style show, expect more in your face dance-style grooves served up in a Deep-South style...Showcasing the incredible range and expressive qualities of the harmonica.

Here are some press clippings about the solo show:

"THE SOLO SHOWS ARE GEMS, WITH A LIVE, LOOPED, BEAT-BOX COMPONENT THAT IS USED AS THE BASIS OF BUILDING UP A LAYERED TUNE FROM JUST VOICE AND THE BLUES HARP. PLUS NOTES FERGUSON, 'EVERYTHING IS PLAYED THROUGH AN OLD BEAT UP AMP WHICH GIVES IT THAT OLD '78 SOUND, KINDA LIKE A HURRICANE GOING THROUGH A LETTERBOX". EXPECT BLUES AND BLUEGRASS WITH SOME CAJUN AND DELTA INFLUENCES FROM THIS CONSUMMATE PERFORMER" -- The Argus June 20th 2007

"APART FROM THE UNIQUENESS/NOVELTY OF IT ALL, THE MUSIC ITSELF IS ALSO A DEEPLY ENRICHING EXPERIENCE" -- translated from Die Burger 21st June 2007

"FOOTSTOMPING, BLUES, BLUEGRASS AND CAJUN OFFERINGS FROM ONE OF THE MOST OUTSTANDING SOLO PERFORMERS YOU ARE LIKELY TO SEE FOR SOME TIME" -- Zula Website

back
Dave Ferguson
Switch to desktop view Switch to mobile view
Go to top
JavaScript is disabled. Unfortunately you can not use the services of the shop not or only partially.