Guitarist Gil Correia, the soul of a true blues man

Gil Correia became a blues guitarist in his early 40s, after clawing his way out of a hard scrabble life. To see Correia on stage with his Gil Correia Band or at jams, you wouldn’t have guessed the 55 year old began playing at 42. He is intensely talented and versatile on stage. He has also developed his own sound.

For his trio Correia plays guitar and vocals, Dave Baker plays drums, and Scott Bonaire plays bass. GCB play out strictly as a blue trio, and they’re starting to introduce their own new material from an upcoming, seven song CD titled Tattoos And Blues.

Five tracks are Correia originals he wrote by his own self. “There’s two instrumentals,” he said. “There’s three songs that have lyrics. Every single one is bluesy, except for one. One track has a got a rock-bluesy edge to it.”

Correia’s instrumentals occurred to him while he was sitting at home with his guitar, experimenting with different grooves, and they just evolved from the creative process. The three vocal originals were inspired by everyday life. A track called “Your Love Is A Prison” is about an old girlfriend. Another track, “It’s A Swing-Swang,” was inspired by Correia’s years of playing west coast swing, when he was serving up songs by Hollywood Fats and T-Bone Walker. “That’ my influence for the swing thing,” he said.

The Tattoos And Blues CD will be released in about two weeks. The seven song disc was produced By Jim Jay Foster at Media Boss Studios in Framingham, Massachusetts. The album will have at least 40 minutes of music on it.

“I’m so proud of it,” Correia said. “It’s got a real big, in-your-face, hit you, emotional sound.”

Correia believes that the CD will make people realize that he is serious about his music, and that he’s not just playing around for the fun of it. “It’s my life. It’s what I feel everyday,” he said.

Correia started seriously playing the guitar at age 42, studying with Rick Russell for a year. After Russell, Correia, took lessons from Kid Bangham, from whom he learned his down and dirty blues style. Correia is also influenced by his good friend Ronnie Earl.

“I love Ronnie Earl because he’s an instrumental guy. He’s a big fan of Magic Sam. I love Kid Bangham because he’s just nasty. He puts a lot of stink of his stuff. He bends a lot of notes. He’s just dirty.”

Correia pulls out his own nasty, down and dirty sound from deep inside himself. The true soul of a blues man, Correia didn’t have the best childhood and his adulthood saw hardship. “We were very poor,” he said. “We come from a large family, six children. We struggled as kids growing up. We didn’t have things that other people had.”

This anguish now pours out of his amps. “Its just the emotion of it coming out,” he said. “Sometimes it’s anger. Sometimes it’s sadness.”

Living through hard times in his late 30s/early 40s, Correia picked up the guitar as a healing thing and found the blues was the best way to express himself. “That’s just the way it started,” he said. “It started as a therapeutic thing and it’s turned into a career.”

Correia believes blues is the natural genre that draws people who need to get their pain out of their systems. “I believe that blues is all emotional, heart-stuff from the soul, from the gut. That’s something you can’t teach somebody. You just have to feel it and live it.”

Correia recently went over big at a packed blues jam at the Black Sheep Tavern in Sterling, Massachusetts. Correia participates in many blues jams, but playing with his trio is his main thing.

“I don’t have a problem with doing a blues jam, being a special guest. But when you’re with your band, it’s like a big warm blanket all around you. We’re all connected musically in the brain, so it’s a pretty cool thing. We are so much on the same page, I don’t even have to say nothing, I can just give a look to my drummer, he knows exactly where I’m going. It’s spiritual.”

Correia had been looking for two guys that he could connect with for a long time. When he finally found them, the chemistry just came together. “We’re all enjoying each other’s company,” the guitarist said.

As a working musician, Correia has been a South Shore staple for several years. Now, he’s trying to break into the market in the Worcester area. He’s been using his appearances at the Sunday afternoon jam, hosted by Worcester band A Ton Of Blues, at The Black Sheep Tavern in Sterling, Massachusetts, to make his mark in Central Massachusetts.

“It’s hard for a blues band to break out and work around Massachusetts, for some reason. I don’t know why,” Correia said.

Correia explained that he became a musician late in his life because he had many personal matters to deal with. “One day I said, ‘I’m going to buy a new guitar, and I’m really going to learn how to play the thing,’ see if I can make a career as a musician because it’s my love and it’s the only thing that makes me happy.”

Starting that late, the guitarist had to really buckle down, discipline himself, and practice like a son of a gun. He spent a lot of time listening to his influences, Jimmy Vaughn, T-Bone Walker, Lowell Fulsom.

“I slept, ate, breathed blues from day one,” he said. “I constantly practiced. I constantly went to shows. Rick Russell was a big influence on me. He helped me get out there and let me play with him. It was a lot of work, but it wasn’t work to me because it was a love.”

Today, audiences are very surprised to learn Correia stated playing at age 42. People who don’t know about his situation assume he’s been playing his whole life. His band is very popular. While recording his CD, Correia and his band were overheard by videographer Ian Barrett( who has a gold record for his work with Godsmack). The next day, Correia received a message that Barrett was looking to make a video of his trio. Fans can look forward to seeing Correia’s physical and frenetic performance as well as hear his CD Tattoos And Blues.

Ronnie Earl has offered a testimonial for Correia’s promo kit: “Gil Correia is the young blues musician who is most reminiscent of Magic Sam and is the future of the blues.

Correia will be the Emcee and one of the organizers of the Onset Blues Festival on Saturday, August 6, 2011, the 19^th year of the event. Gates open at Noon. The bands play from 2:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Four bands will play first, then the Onset Blue Project, Correia’s band with Rosemary Casey’s horn section, backing special guests, Kid Bangham and Sugar Ray, Doug Bell, James Montgomery, and Luke Mulholland. Onset is in the village of Wareham, Massachusetts. “It’s a beautiful venue,” Correia said. “The band shell’s right across the street from the pair. It’s a great family thing. You can bring your family and your young children. It’s a beautiful day.”

Cleary, Correia will be a very busy guy for the next few months. It will be interesting to see how far a “late bloomer” can go in this business.

Gil Correia is on Facebook.

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