Cover photo © 2025 Bob Kieser

It has been more than four years since senior writer Marty Gunther gave Blues Blast readers an in-depth look at the career of Duke Robillard, one of the blues genre’s most influential guitarists, with a career that spans seven decades during which he founded Roomful of Blues, did stints with the Fabulous Thunderbirds and the Legendary Blues Band in addition to a lengthy discography of outstanding releases under his own name.

During a recent conversation in the aftermath of his appearance at the Winter Blues Festival in Des Moines, Iowa, sponsored by the Central Iowa Blues Society, the guitarist brought us up-to-date on his most recent projects.

“Oh, I had a ball at Winter Blues because, besides the fact that the people there were just so nice, I haven’t really played in Iowa in quite a long time. I used to play Cedar Rapids and Des Moines many, many years ago and forgot how just nice people were there. It also was one of the few blues festivals that I’ve been at where almost all the acts were really blues acts, not blues rock acts. I have nothing against the form of blues rock, but it just seems very rare that you hear that many actual traditional style blues bands under one roof. Plus I got to see so many old friends like Anson Funderburgh and Darrell Nulisch. I hadn’t seen them in years and years, so it was so great to hear them.”

His band for the festival set included his regular drummer Mark Teixeira along with guitarist Doug Deming and Andrew Gohman, a member of Deming’s band the Jewel Tones, on upright and Fender bass.

“I still really enjoy playing. Whatever instrument you play, it’s especially fun to play with another person who plays the same instrument as you, and plays it well. I thought Doug and I fit together extremely well with literally no rehearsal at all. It was really special. As I get older, I look forward to playing with different people and gaining experiences I haven’t had. Before, when I was younger, I loved to play with different people, but I was very set on making my mark, playing my own music, and doing my own thing. But now that I’m older, I like the chance to get to play with different people. It makes it a lot of fun.”

The guitarist has released a total of five recordings in the last five years, an impressive total under any circumstances. Listening to each of the projects, one quickly begins to appreciate the scope of Robillard’s artistry.

“It’s been not only been a prolific period, but there is plenty of variety from one release to the next. That’s something I always strive for. My quest in music throughout my whole life has been to find music that was rooted in the blues. There are songs where I would go back and find out how it was connected to the blues and what it meant to me, like early jazz, which is very important to me, and it’s very connected to the blues.

“Louis Armstrong was one of the greatest blues players ever, but you don’t hear that mentioned. The song “West End Blues” was recorded in God knows what year, might’ve been 1928 or1929. It was one of the most important things because it was technically unbelievable, yet it was a straight 12 bar blues.

“What he played was so beautiful, and he expressed himself so beautifully through that song. What he played had never been done on any instrument. His trumpet playing was so fluid, so melodic, and so amazingly soulful. Nobody had ever played an improvisation that technically beautiful. I don’t think about time when I think about music, as music is truly timeless, and great music is great forever!”

Robillard’s variety in his musical approach is facilitated by several musicians who have been with him for quite some time. When you have musicians the caliber of Bruce Bears on keyboards, Mark Teixeira on drums, Marty Ballou on acoustic and electric bass, and Doug James on baritone and tenor saxophone, Robillard knows that the quality will be there no matter what direction he takes.

“They bring authenticity to the table. Anybody that plays in my band, if they don’t come in being schooled in all the aspects of the kind of different styles of blues that I play, they need to get into that and learn it. They all came in very well-schooled musicians and certainly have played with amazing people before they played with me. I like to play music while we’re driving when we’re on the road and we all turn each other on to stuff.

“All of those musicians have a real love of all the different genres of black music – jazz, blues, gospel, soul, R& B, even some early rock and roll. Fats Domino, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, those three guys were what started me in music, listening to them along with a few other like Buddy Holly, Elvis, and Jerry Lee Lewis. The power and the fire of it all is really what got me playing guitar in the first place.”

In 2024, Stony Plain Records released Roll With Me, an album that reached back in time.

“That is a funny story because that album was recorded roughly 20 years ago, at least most of it. We recorded nine tracks and then I added more tracks to it. At the time, I had got some ideas for another album. I got kind of inspired to do a different album. So we put the first one aside. I thought I would finish it next after the album that had me all excited. However, it ended up sitting on the shelf because I kept coming up with new ideas every year for another project.

“I knew it was a really strong record and I was very anxious to complete it, but it didn’t get finished until it was time for my final Stony Plain album. Stony Plain sold out their label to a big publishing company. So, it was my time to finish up the album I had in the can. I added some more tracks to it, finishing it up just last year.

“I’m really proud of it. I think it’s one of my best blues albums, kind of an overview of a long period of my career. It’s got a lot of my roots, a lot of my original songs. It features Chris Cote on vocals on two of the tunes. Matt McCabe is a pianist on most of it. The newer stuff has Bruce Bears, but Matt McCabe is a long time friend of mine, a guy that was in my band and several other great. blues bands for many years before that.

“Some of the very first blues I learned were from people like Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Sonny Boy Williamson. people like that. Then Joe Turner came just a little bit later. In fact, Joe Turner is one of the people that inspired me to start Roomful of Blues right after I had got out of high school. The first album I heard of his was The Boss Of The Blues Sings Kansas City Jazz, that album on Atlantic Records just completely floored me, changed my whole mind around as far as blues with a horn section that swung.

“It took a big hold on me and really is still my favorite genre. He’s important as a pioneer of rock and roll as much as he is anything else, Kansas City jazz and blues or anything. His rock and roll records, “Shake, Rattle and Roll,” “Flip, Flop,And Fly,” all of those records he made in the fifties were some of the best of the rock and roll records of that period by a black artist.”

In 2023, Robillard was a key part of a release by MIG Records, an Italian label. Entitled A Smooth One, it featured a 2022 recording session in Italy with the guitarist, Teixiera on drums, and Alberto Marsico on organ.

“That kind of jazz is some of my favorite music, an organ trio or quartet jazz with organ, drums, and guitar, or with a saxophone. A lot of those are my favorite records. I’m a big fan of that sound, people like Jack McDuff on organ with Willis Jackson on tenor saxophone. Jack McDuff is probably my favorite organist in that style because he’s just got that beautiful greasy, bluesy, R& B sound along with jazz elements. Alberto Marsico is another incredible musician.

“I went over to Italy to do a week of workshops for guitarists. And while I was there, we talked a lot about music and what we loved. Alberto expressed an interest in making a record together. So he planned it by the end of the week of the lessons I was giving. We had a little hour long rehearsal in his basement, then went into the studio the next day. I guess in about four hours we cut that album, all material that we both were familiar with.

“I’m very pleased with that record, especially considering how quick we did it. There was no time to practice and work-up any arrangements. Mark Teixeira has been very schooled in that style of music also. So it was extra fun for all three of us to just do that. It flowed so naturally. One of the songs we did, “Body And Fender Man,” is a song that I love that Johnny Adams did. Doc Pomus, the legendary songwriter, and I wrote that song together. He gave me the lyrics and I came up with the arrangement and the melody for it. It was kind of a natural thing for Alberto and me to do in a funk style for the album. It’s a fun song.”

But that wasn’t enough for the intrepid guitar master. The same year saw an album released by M.C. Records entitled Six Strings of Steel, billed as Duke Robillard and his All-Star Band, with Teixeira, Ballou, Bears, James and Cote on vocals

“I certainly think they deserve to be called All -Stars. My guys play with a lot of different people in this area or even not in this area. They are working even when my band is not working. They record, tour, and do local gigs with a lot of different artists. They’re pretty much the go-to guys in this area. They certainly have really good reputations in their own right, that’s for sure.

“Six Strings of Steel came from me wanting to do an album that was really varied in the sense of all the different kinds of styles of music that I play. I feel like we really did well in that regard, going from a Bob Dylan song to all different kind of tunes, original tunes, blues tunes, R& B tunes. We covered an awful lot of things, from Smiley Lewis to Link Wray and everything in between! That might have been the first tune I ever learned to play on guitar, “Rumble” by Link Wray. I was like a seven year old kid when that record came out. I wasn’t allowed to have a guitar, but my brothers both did. So I would sneak their guitars when they weren’t around and teach myself to play those songs that are the beginning of my roots.”

In 2022, the German label MIG released Duke’s Mood – Live In Bremmen1985 & 2008. a three disc set, one featuring a 1985 live show featuring Robillard with his trio, the Pleasure Kings, and the other two capturing a set with his full band.

“The first disc goes back to my earliest days of in Europe. Those tunes and that band were very well received. It showed me off at a time when I was at the top of my game as far as my chops goes, technically speaking. We had such good audiences wherever we went in those days. I’m proud of that record, especially the Pleasure Kings part of it.

“That was a good time in my life, when I was first getting worldwide acceptance. I went to Scandinavia the first time, went to Finland, Sweden, and Norway, sold out every show that we did. It had something to do with the times. It was the mid eighties. My band was getting popular as I was just restarting my career after leaving Roomful of Blues, and I had an entirely different sound, totally guitar oriented because we were a trio.

“That was a very cool period where groups like the Fabulous Thunderbirds and Robert Cray were also getting popular. Things were slow starting here in the US. But once we put that record out, the first album with the Pleasure Kings, and went over to Europe, it was an instant audience for us. That was very gratifying and definitely gave me confidence to keep making music..

Robillard ushered in 2022 with another Stony Plain project, They Called It Rhythm & Blues.

“We started that album right at the beginning of COVID and had to do it quick because things were getting shut down everywhere. The label wanted me to have a lot of guests, so I called out a bunch of my friends and band-mates that I’ve played with over the years, like Kim Wilson, John Hammond, Sue Foley, and Sugar Ray Norcia. Sue and I had known each other for years, but we never had recorded with each other. That’s why I asked her. We also had Michelle Wilson on vocals. Sugar Ray and I play together quite often and he’s been one of my musical friends since the early seventies, or maybe even late sixties. We both started out that long ago.”

Another project in the works is Robillard’s autobiography, filled with personal reminisces about his stellar career. But recent events have temporarily slowed his progress towards completion.

“It’s going slow, honestly, because I have been busy. I recently had my computer hard drive crash and it wasn’t fixable, so I lost everything, but luckily I had printed out the first hundred pages I had written. So I have to kind of start over again. But I’ve got all the pages and I’m going to expound on them as I go along, add things in it. Of course, I’ve got a lot more than a hundred pages worth of material, but it’s a good start. It’s a fine excuse for me to get right back to work on it and try to get it finished off.”

Decades of playing guitar and seemingly endless nights on the road can take a toll on the human body. Robillard has been dealing with a serious injury that almost curtailed his career. He is thankful that a lifetime of musical experiences prepared him for being able to adapt his approach while maintaining his high standards.

“Health-wise, the biggest setback was I completely lost a rotator cuff in my left shoulder by not really understanding what it was and having pain for a long time, just thinking I had a bruise from constant use, because I was playing a lot at that time. I wasn’t really aware of what the rotator cuff was or what it did. I ended up finding out that I had a problem and I needed surgery.

“By the time I got the surgery, it was too late. The cuff had completely let go and was left unfixed for a number of years. It kind of shriveled up and wasn’t able to be reconnected. Atrophied, that’s the word. They went in to fix it, but there was nothing they could do. Other muscles and tendons in my shoulder have learned to do the job of the rotator cuff, but it’s never quite the same. Certain things I can’t do that were a big part of my playing. But life goes on and you find new ways, come up with new things. It hasn’t stopped me from coming up with new things to do and new ways to interpret and play what I used to be able to do.

“Playing music is just being able to express yourself and if you have to change the way you do it, as long as you’re still expressing yourself, you just find a different way to say what you want to say. I’m really blessed because, if I just played one way and wasn’t able to do it, I might have given up by now. I’ve been lucky to be able to play many different styles, so I just go into a different mode if I’m having trouble doing one thing. It’s frustrating sometimes, but in general I feel satisfied when I play.

“Even somebody who has all those chops can still go for something and not quite hit it. If something doesn’t quite happen exactly like you hoped it would, that’s part of what music is, improvising and going for it, making whatever good you can out of it. There’s some people that think blues can be boring. But there’s so much to blues music, and so many ways to play it. I think it’s forever exciting. I’ve never once gotten bored with the idea of playing blues because there’s so many ways you can interpret it. I plan to keep doing that for as long as my hands will work.”

Check out Duke’s website to see when he is playing near you at https://www.dukerobillard.com/