BLUES FESTIVAL WILL SHOWCASE DIVERSE STYLISTS

Kevin Morrow has a bad case of the blues--and, like Typhoid Mary, he’s out to infect everyone he meets.

His partner in Falk & Morrow Talent, Malcolm Falk, has already fallen victim to the disease. For more than a year, the two promoters have brought a legion of blues acts to nightclubs all over the county.

The Belly Up Tavern also has contracted blues fever. In the last six years, the spacious Solana Beach nightclub has been the site of more than 100 big-name blues concerts by everyone from the late Big Mama Thornton to John Lee Hooker.

Still, Morrow said, he won’t be satisfied with anything short of a countywide plague. So on Sunday night, he and Falk hope to spread the fever by staging the San Diego Blues Festival, structured along the lines of the Long Beach and San Francisco festivals. Morrow hopes to make it an annual event.

The five-hour concert, appropriately enough, will be held at the Belly Up Tavern. The talent lineup, Morrow said, will consist of seven diverse blues stylists from around the country:

- Johnny Copeland, the sizzling guitarist from Houston who for three decades has followed in the footsteps of Texas swing-blues progenitors T-Bone Walker and Lightnin’ Hopkins.

- Rockin’ Dopsie, the accordionist from Louisiana who has succeeded Clifton Chenier as the king of zydeco (the rousing Cajun party music that’s equal parts swamp blues, French folk, New Orleans rhythm-and-blues and rock ‘n’ roll).

- Earl King, one of New Orleans’ top rhythm-and-blues singers whose string of hits, which dates to the 1950s, includes “Come On” (later recorded by Jimi Hendrix) and “Always a First Time.”

- Katie Webster, the swamp blues piano queen from Louisiana whose meaty tinklings have graced albums by Slim Harpo, Lonnie Brooks and Otis Redding.

- Alex Moore, at 86 the oldest surviving “barrelhouse blues” pianist from Texas and a former sideman of the late Blind Lemon Jefferson.

- Joe Louis Walker, along with Robert Cray a leader in the new generation of blues revivalists.

- The King Biscuit Blues Band, a San Diego institution whose tenure as the house band at Mandolin Wind has made the Hillcrest nightclub one of the few blues outposts in town for more than five years.

Morrow said the main factor behind his decision to produce such an ambitious festival is the resurgence that blues has been enjoying, nationwide, for the past few years.

“When the Long Beach Blues Festival started out six years ago, it attracted 3,000 people,” Morrow said. “Last year, it drew more than 15,000.

“Locally, too, the blues are growing in popularity. Five years ago, there were only a handful of blues concerts in San Diego, and they were all held at the Belly Up. Now, there are several dozen each year, and not just at the Belly Up, but at places like the Bacchanal in Clairemont, the Halcyon in Point Loma and Humphrey’s on Shelter Island.”

The reason for the upsurge, Morrow said, is the public’s growing awareness of the rich musical history behind the blues--an awareness that has been heightened by the Hollywood movie industry.

“A few years ago, the ‘Blues Brothers’ movie came out, and all of a sudden the whole country was subjected to all this great stuff many of them, especially the young kids, had never even seen or heard before,” Morrow said.

“It didn’t stop there, either. Blues songs started to show up on movie sound tracks, and then last year another movie, ‘Crossroads,’ was centered on a blues guy.

“As a result, people have gotten lots of exposure to the blues in recent years, and that makes them much more willing to take a chance with other blues styles and artists.”

Morrow said he is capitalizing on the schedule of the blues festivals in Long Beach and San Francisco.

“Every year toward the end of summer, the West Coast gets barraged by blues artists from Chicago, Louisiana and Texas who come out here to play at the other two festivals,” Morrow said. He is taking advantage of that by bringing them “down to San Diego for a festival of our own.”

Eventually, Morrow said, he would like to see the San Diego Blues Festival expand to a larger, outdoor site.

“It’s difficult to hear the blues and not like them,” Morrow said. “Unlike most types of music, the blues come straight from the heart. There are no pretentions; the blues are honest expressions of the stuff we all deal with everyday: women, not having work, drinking, things like that.

“Everybody can relate to the blues, and by giving them this type of exposure, maybe more people will start to realize that.”