Hooked on the blues Redwood City's John 'Blues' Boyd had a long road to the stage

Boyd was just 20 at the time, and Moore 25. The young man from Mississippi spent the better part of his life picking cotton and singing

the blues with his father before he met Moore, a former model from New York City.

The blues, however, was not in Boyd’s immediate future back at that young age — but marriage was.

The couple wed in 1965 and spent a number of years, even decades, struggling to make ends meet as Boyd worked as a roofer. They ended up in Redwood City in the mid-1970s and have lived there ever since.

After 20 years of marriage, Boyd finally decided in 1986 to hop on stage at a club called the Loading Zone in downtown Redwood City and got hooked on performing live. Twenty-five years later, the singer is now known as John "Blues” Boyd as his band packs in clubs from San Jose to San Francisco.

Now 66, Boyd has since retired as a roofer but his wife of 46 years is now ailing and is unable to make it to her husband’s gigs. She does, however, now help her husband manage his music career.

"My wife was trying to get me to perform the whole time,” Boyd said. "We had a poor life, with a string of misfortunes. When I got on stage and performed live for the first time, though, I felt a love for the blues.”

Boyd can’t stay away from his wife for long, he is constantly by her side except on those nights when John "Blues” Boyd and Friends perform live.

He does not take the time to rehearse either. "We don’t rehearse a damn thing. We just show up and I say ‘play a slow tear dropper or a shuffle’ and that’s it,” Boyd said. His bandmates, including saxophonist Don Baraka, are seasoned professionals and know blues standards well.

"When I first got started I didn’t even know all of the lyrics to most of my favorite songs,” he said. "Somebody told me I better learn them.”

Now, he knows almost all of them.

His biggest infl uences are Bobby "Blue” Bland, "Big” Joe Turner, John Lee Hooker, T-Bone Walker and his favorite, Little Jr. Parker.

Parker’s "Mystery Train” and "Pretty Baby/That’s Alright” are two of Boyd’s favorite songs to sing on stage.

He doesn’t play guitar or harmonica,though. "It’s just my voice,” he said.

His mother sang in a Baptist church choir and, while she was pregnant with her son, Boyd’s father would sing and play the blues to his unborn child.

"I could be heard singing the blues in my backyard when I was 3 years old,” Boyd said.

At a young age, Boyd saw B.B. King and Albert King perform but did not have enough money to see Little Jr. Parker on the night he came to town.

He also gave up a chance to sing with Bobby "Blue” Bland when he was just 17 because he was too shy, he said.

He is not shy now, though, about his love for the music and hopes to help keep the blues alive through his performances.

Now, Boyd’s voice can be heard frequently at the British Bankers Club in Menlo Park. He also performs at the Flight Lounge in San Carlos and at Club Fox in downtown Redwood City.

And although money is tight, Boyd plays for the love of the music and not so much for the paycheck.

"I love the blues. I just love it,” he said.