COMING down with a severe case of the blues is not necessarily a bad thing — especially if you are talking about the Bermuda Folk Club's Blues Night, an entertaining evening that attracted scores of revellers to its Trott Road venue last Saturday.The blues is a vocal and instrumental form of music based on a pentatonic scale and a characteristic 12-bar chord progression.

The form evolved in the United States in the communities of former African slaves from field hollers, spirituals, praise songs, shouts, and chants. The use of blue notes and the prominence of call-and-response patterns in the music and lyrics are indicative of the Blues' West African pedigree.

The blues has been a major influence on later American and Western popular music, finding expression in ragtime, jazz, bluegrass, rhythm and blues, rock and roll, hip—hop, and country music, as well as conventional pop songs.

Making a return performance was the duo of Val Wallace and Dennis Eldridge, who gave the audience a taste of their original compositions. Visitors Chris and Allison Keane gave a fine showing of themselves as they reeled off a string of Eric Clapton classics, including I'm Tore Down, Hootchie Coothie Man and Cocaine.

The husband and wife duo showed some initial nervousness but after the feeling-out process was over there was no stopping the Keanes. After their set was completed they received a well deserved round of applause.

Seasoned crooner Michael Kilpatrick found herself giving an impromptu performance as she wasn't originally on the bill until the last moment. Digging deep into her repertoire, she opened with House of the Rising Sun. The audience was treated to two original songs from the Muscle Shoals native entitled If I Find Heaven and This Great Divide.

By the end of her gig Kilpatrick had raised the bar but the following performers were not going to outdone.

Matt Clifford was next to grace the stage and the Bermuda Lacrosse Club contingent were front and centre to cheer on one of their own as he kicked things off with Dire Straits Sultans of Swing. This was followed by a Mike Erica tune and he closed out his set with Ytravis Trent's Same Thing and a Clifford original entitled The Expat.

The duo of Joy Barnum and Thaao Dill rattled off a string of original tunes including Children of the Sun, The Hare wins the Race, What You Don't Know Should Kill You and a cover of a tune by Linsay Lohan.

The phrase "the blues" is a synonym for having a case of "the blue devils", meaning low spirit, depression and sadness. But that traditional definition was turned on its head during a reunion performance of Last Rights, featuring Rob Lansing on lead guitar and Dennis Eldridge on rhythmn guitar.

With the loss of lead guitarist Paul Gibbons and then, after breaking his wrist, rhythm guitarist Keith Phillips announced his departure from the group, the popular band have been on an extended hiatus.

The reunion, sans Phillips, was a joyful one as Lansing and Eldridge joined the purveyors of rock and reggae to help close the show. Their ten-song set included songs by Wilson Pickett, Third World, Louie Prima, the Rolling Stones and Elton John.

Drummer Jamie Petty was elated with the reunion gig.

"We are the last bastion of no compromise. That was how we got our name Last Rights. After a two-year layoff it is good to be back again," he said.

The next show at the club is an overseas act, Ladies' Night, featuring performers Jodi Harman and Kimberly.