When EG Kight comes to town, followers can catch her performances anywhere from a blues festival to a house concert to a club. While she travels internationally with a full band called Blue South, the Georgia Songbird also logs many solo shows per year that both engage and entertain blues lovers with her voice, guitar licks, and songwriting.
While many blues singers favor a raucous vocal style, EG’s voice, while powerful, is honeysmooth and nuanced. She once invited my sister and me to sing back-up with her on John Prine’s “Angel from Montgomery,” which we rehearsed quickly before joining her on a friend’s backyard festival stage. Without missing a beat in her own soulful vocal part, she turned ever-so-slightly to conduct my sister and me in a slowed down delivery of the lyrics “hard way to go.” She started calling us the Raisonettes after that.
Like Bonnie Raitt, Kight doesn’t stop at singing. Besides fronting her band, she plays some of the tastiest blues licks you will ever hear on her solo acoustic and electric guitars. But unlike Raitt, Kight is also a prolific songwriter and producer. While she covers some blues standards, most Kight recordings showcase her own compositions as the anchor cuts. And she has shared her producer’s ear with other blues artists like Oxford’s own Lisa Biales. In fact, a few years back, Lisa and EG showcased at Arts Midwest as The Peach-Pickin’ Mamas since they enjoy harmonizing and trading licks.
In addition to generosity with other performers, Kight has a gift for mimicry that she weaves into her solo shows. My favorite is her musical impression of Dolly Parton. If you get a chance to see EG perform live, her vocals, guitar-slinging, and great songs like “Trouble” will lift your spirits and might just propel you to the dance floor.
EG Kight will be performing Saturday, September 23rd at 7:30pm in the Downtown Listening Room in the historic Shillito's Building in downtown Cincinnati, to a sold-out audience. Lisa Biales will be opening for her.