PHOTOGRAPHS BY JOE CANTRELL
Day Two of the Waterfront Blues Festival dug deep into the spirit of music and life with an extraordinary set by the Spiritual Brothers and their sounds of Northern Ghana and Burkina Faso. Unlike the four-day festival’s first day on the Fourth of July, there were no fireworks over the river. But there was plenty of fire in the music on Friday, a day that also included sharp sets by the likes of Harpdog Brown & the Uptown Blues Band, Larkin Poe, Terry Hancke, the California Honeydrops, Lloyd Jones, Lisa Mann with Lara Price, Monti Amundson, Brother Yusef, Arietta Ward (daughter of the legendary, late Portland pianist Janice Scroggins) and others.

The four-day festival, which transforms Portland’s Tom McCall Waterfront Park through Sunday, is a highlight of the Pacific Northwest’s summer music season, drawing thousands of revelers every day. Saturday’s schedule features a lot of Louisiana sounds – Curley Taylor & Zydeco Trouble, Lil’ Pookie & the Zydeco Sensations, Mysti Krewe Mardi Gras Parade, Chubby Carrier & His Bayou Swamp Band – plus the likes of top locals LaRhonda & the Steele Family Band, the Terry Robb Quartet, Norman Sylvester’s Allstar Revue, and more. Your single-day tickets – $20 in advance, $25 at the gate – get you the entire day from 10 a.m. until after dark, and in addition to paying for the musicians and the music, help support the nonprofit Sunshine Division, which distributes food and clothing to people in the metropolitan area who need them.
Photographer Joe Cantrell was on site once again all day long, documenting the excitement on the stage and in the crowd. Some highlights from his Day Two shoots:
SPIRITUAL BROTHERS









LARA PRICE, SINGER & DRUMMER WITH LISA MANN



TERRY HANCKE


FACES IN THE CROWD













LARKIN POE: SISTERS REBECCA AND MEGAN LOVELL





HARPDOG BROWN & THE UPTOWN BLUES BAND






GOODNIGHT TO DAY TWO

- Waterfront Blues: a bang-up start. Joe Cantrell photographs opening day at the festival, complete with Fourth of July fireworks.
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