Buy tickets

Ticket Type Price (£) Fee (£) Quantity

PAUL JONES & DAVE KELLY

ACOUSTIC BLUES DONE RIGHT

Two British blues legends. One guitar. One harmonica. A lifetime in the music.

Paul Jones and Dave Kelly return to Barnoldswick Music & Arts Centre in early 2027 — two giants of British rhythm & blues bringing the music right back to where it belongs: stripped down, acoustic, intimate and played from the soul.

Between them, Jones and Kelly have spent well over half a century immersed in the blues. These aren't musicians recreating a period they discovered later in life. They were there when Britain first fell under the spell of Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson, John Lee Hooker and the great Delta and Chicago bluesmen — and they helped carry that music into a new generation.

Long before Manfred Mann and Do Wah Diddy Diddy made him a household name, Paul Jones was a blues obsessive. As a teenager he devoured records by Lead Belly, Lightnin' Hopkins, Muddy Waters, Little Walter and Sonny Boy Williamson, teaching himself the language of the blues harmonica.

Remarkably, one of the young musicians who helped him understand the instrument was Brian Jones, shortly before Brian formed The Rolling Stones. Paul was also drawn into the extraordinary London blues world surrounding Alexis Korner, the scene that became a breeding ground for the musicians who would transform British music.

Even during the chart success of Manfred Mann, the blues remained at Jones' core. That devotion would eventually lead him back to the music completely — as a singer, harmonica player and one of Britain's great blues ambassadors.

For 32 years, his blues broadcasting on BBC Radio 2 helped introduce the music and its artists to millions. His contribution has also been recognised with three consecutive British Blues Awards for Harmonica Player of the Year, alongside honours for blues broadcasting and his lifetime contribution to the genre.

Then there is Dave Kelly.

If anybody possesses genuine British blues pedigree, it's Dave.

Growing up in South London alongside his sister, acclaimed blues singer and guitarist Jo-Ann Kelly, he became fascinated by the raw acoustic blues of Robert Johnson, Son House and the Delta masters. Tony McPhee of The Groundhogs helped him discover the open tunings and bottleneck techniques that would become such an important part of his own playing.

By 1964 Kelly was already appearing at the legendary Half Moon Putney. Two years later, still a teenager, he was playing at Gerde's Folk City in New York.

It was there that an extraordinary encounter took place.

Kelly met Muddy Waters backstage, picked up an acoustic guitar and began playing slide. Muddy listened — and then showed the young English guitarist a chord voicing.

Dave was still using it decades later.

Back in Britain, Kelly joined the John Dummer Blues Band, and suddenly found himself even closer to the source. He toured Britain backing John Lee Hooker twice and Howlin' Wolf, before later touring and recording with Son House.

Imagine that education.

Not learning the blues from YouTube or instructional books, but standing alongside the men who created it — listening, watching and learning night after night.

Kelly's path would also cross with figures including Buddy Guy, Junior Wells, Freddie King, Hubert Sumlin and James Burton, while his beautifully economical acoustic guitar and bottleneck slide playing developed into one of the most distinctive sounds in British blues.

In 1979, Jones and Kelly finally joined forces with Tom McGuinness, Gary Fletcher and Hughie Flint to form The Blues Band.

Initially the record industry wasn't interested.

So they made their own record.

The Official Blues Band Bootleg Album began with just 3,000 copies, but word spread and what had started almost as a group of friends playing blues for the sheer love of it became one of Britain's great blues institutions.

For more than four decades, The Blues Band toured internationally, recorded extensively and carried traditional blues into clubs, theatres and festivals around the world.

When the band finally stepped away from touring after 43 years, Jones and Kelly simply carried on doing what they had always done — playing the blues together.

And perhaps this stripped-back acoustic setting is where you hear them best.

Two voices. Dave's acoustic guitar and bottleneck slide. Paul's harmonica.

And songs drawn from a lifetime immersed in Delta blues, country blues, Chicago blues and rhythm & blues.

Between them come the stories — Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Howlin' Wolf, Son House, Alexis Korner, Brian Jones and the characters encountered during more than six decades on the road.

Veteran music journalist Chris Welch described one of their acoustic performances as "a triumph", praising playing and singing that was "quite riveting."

Another reviewer captured the combination beautifully: Kelly's dexterous guitar playing alongside Jones' wailing harmonica creating "a masterclass in downright dirty blues."

And they're certainly not living purely on past glories.

Dave Kelly received the UK Blues Federation Lifetime Achievement Award in 2025, recognition for more than six decades devoted to the music. His recent album Sun On My Face showed a musician still writing, recording and exploring.

Paul Jones remains equally connected to today's blues world, recording and performing with artists across generations. In 2026, reflecting on an extraordinary musical life, he summed things up perfectly:

"The list is still growing, and I'm still having a great time."

And now they're coming back to Barnoldswick Music & Arts Centre.

In a room this intimate, there is nowhere for music to hide — and with musicians like these, nothing needs hiding.

You'll hear Dave's fingers and slide against the strings.

You'll hear every breath Paul puts through that harmonica.

You'll hear songs whose roots stretch back to the Mississippi Delta, the South Side of Chicago and the tiny British clubs where a generation of young musicians first discovered this extraordinary music.

And you'll hear them played by two men who have carried the blues with them for virtually their entire lives.

This isn't two musicians looking back at blues history.

Paul Jones and Dave Kelly are part of that history.