Welcome blues fans to the 2012 Bonita Blues Festival

We are very excited about the 2012 Bonita Blues Festival. We have been working on putting together a great line up for you this year, a line up that includes storied performers like Magic Slim and the Teardrops  and Tinsley Ellis , and unbelievable rising stars like Trampled Under Foot, Karen Lovely, Damon Fowler Group, Mel Melton  with the Wicked Mojo's and Skyla Burell . We have also included great local artists to showcase this year which include Stringtown , Deb and the Dynamics , The Kim Page Band , Mudbone featuring Rick Howard and the Gladezmen.

The Bonita Blues Charitable Foundation is proud to announce the charities  we have selected to assist this year. They are the Bonita Assistance office, which offers "a hand up not a hand out", The Music for Minors Program, supplying instrument's for local kids who can't afford them, the local chapter of the Wounded Warriors Project and The Music Therapy program at the Children's Hospital of Southwest Florida, which we had an opportunity to experience first hand and just seeing the effects of music on these children, we are so proud to add them as a charity this year.

We hope you will take notice of the early sponsors that our listed on our website. Without sponsors we could not bring the festival to all of you. We hope you will support the sponsors because they are the reason the Bonita Blues Festival is now in it’s sixth year! If you would like to become a sponsor of the Bonita Blues Festival please contact us. This is a non-profit event and the proceeds will be distributed locally to our charities. We still need your help to make this the best event yet.

Please join us in the lovely city of Bonita Springs at Riverside Park, on March 9 – 10, 2012 for a great weekend of blues music. Just kick back, dance or relax and through your efforts, we can all help put smiles on the faces of our attendees and charitable recipients.

Have a Bluesafull day,
Kevin and Jennifer Barry
Len Eckert
Directors of the BBCF

The BBF Committee won best non-profit in the boat parade!

The 2011 Bonita Blues Fest recently received a stellar write-up in BluesSource. Read on friends....

I may not be very smart ...... and I've been told that on many occasions, but I've proven the saying "You can't teach an old dog news tricks" is totally not true. In my mis-spent youth I was always under the mistaken impression that "bigger was better." Well when it comes to blues festivals, that's not necessarily true. I've been to the Chicago Blues Festival, Pocono Blues Festival, San Francisco Blues Festival, Tampa Bay Blues Festival, The Heritage Blues Festival and the list goes on. But I'm finding that the smaller, town backed festivals are more enjoyable to attend: the Madison Ribberfest in Madison, Indiana, Michigan festivals including the Kalamazoo Blues Festival, the Flint Blues Festival, Old Town Blues Festival in Lansing. And now I can add the Bonita Springs Blues Festival to this list. This was our first visit to this festival, and I can tell you it won't be our last.

The city of Bonita Springs, Florida is not large by any stretch, but with a population of almost 44,000 it's not small town USA either. Nestled in between Naples and Ft. Meyers, it's become known as the "Gateway to the Gulf."  But it has small town sensibility and supports its causes. A group of friends went to a music festival at Pine Island and, because of a random comment made there, the Bonita Springs Charitable Foundation was born. And from that came the Bonita Springs Blues Festival.

The Bonita Blues Charitable Foundation was founded to present high-quality Blues music to our community while raising funds to support local charities.

Over the past four years we have donated approximately $30,000 to charities including, The Liberty Youth Ranch, The Shelter for Abused Women and Children, Healthy Start, The Bonita Springs Assistance Office, the Immokalee Friendship House and Music For Minors. For 2011 we have once again selected the Bonita Springs Assistance Office and Music For Minors as our benefactors for our fifth festival.

The Bonita Springs Assistance Office lends financial and other support to anyone in the community that needs help. Music For Minors provides musical instruments to children that cannot afford them and encourages them to perform well in school so they can keep the instruments. In 2010 the proceeds from the festival provided fourteen instruments to children in Lee County.

As founders, we are so grateful for all of the support we receive from the community to make the Bonita Blues Festival a success. From the beginning the City of Bonita Springs has encouraged and supported our efforts. We are very fortunate that the City of Bonita Springs has the finest outdoor venue is southwest Florida. Of course, none of this would have been possible without our sponsors, advertisers and the many volunteers that donate their time throughout the year and at the event.

We are so excited to present the milestone, fifth-annual Bonita Blues Festival on March 11 & 12, 2011. Please join us for a stellar line-up of musicians as we support our local charities.

Bonita Blues Charitable Foundation
P.O. Box 367385,
Bonita Springs
FL, 34136.
Tax exempt number 26-1094480