The long-awaited, much anticipated Samantha Fish Cigar Box Guitar Festival–New Orleans is totally virtual, taking place both Friday, March 19, and Saturday, March 20, at 7 p.m. CDT, and streaming on Mandolin.com. Each evening’s program will feature an opening montage of performances by some of the world’s top cigar box guitarists from their home locations. The remaining portion each night will be a rousing set by Fish, her band, and different guests from the friendly confines of the Chickie Wah Wah club in New Orleans.
Over the course of both nights, Louisiana culture-bearers Walter “Wolfman” Washington, Big Chief Monk Boudreaux, Jonathan Long, Johnny Sansone and others will be joining Samantha onstage. Leading American CBG acts JP Soars, John Nickel, Steve Arvey, and Cigar Box Serenaders will perform, along with European artists Superdownhome, Ghalia Volt, and Dusk Brothers.
Livestream Single Show Ticket, $25. Two-Day Livestream Ticket, $40. Additional information, full schedule at www.SamanthaFishCigarBoxGuitarFestival.com.
Announcing the Winners of the Samantha Fish International Cigar Box Guitar Video Playoffs
The results are in! The three winners of the Samantha Fish International CBG Video Playoffs are:
1st Place – Talented Belgian one-woman-band, Ghalia Volt
2nd Place – An Australian living in Nashville, 8 Ball Aitken
3rd Place – Dutch group The New American Farmers
A panel of entertainment professionals narrowed the 48 entries down to ten finalists; a group of previous Festival ticket purchasers chose the winners.
Submissions were received from twenty states and nine foreign countries, making it a truly International event. The contestants were solos, duos and groups whose music covered the full spectrum, including rock, blues, jazz, country, pop, and gospel.
“On behalf of Samantha, the festival producers and myself, I would like to congratulate our talented winners, and thank each one of the acts who took the time and effort to submit,” remarked Ben “Gitty” Baker of C. B. Gitty Crafter Supply, the contest sponsor.
The winners will share $1,000 in prize money. All three winning video submissions will be shown as part of the Samantha Fish Cigar Box Guitar Festival Day Two Showcase on Saturday, March 20.
The New Orleans Cigar Box Guitar Festival was founded in 2016, quickly gaining a reputation for presenting outstanding entertainment. The 2019 NOCBGF won OffBeat Magazine’s Neighborhood Festival of the Year award. In 2020, guitarist Samantha Fish and NOCBGF partnered to expand the growth and outreach of the festival and the cigar box guitar. The resulting Samantha Fish Cigar Box Guitar Festival featured a roster of amazingly talented acts that captivated those in attendance. This year’s episode promises to be equally impressive.
The focus of the festival is to celebrate the great music and rich cultural history of the cigar box guitar and similar homemade instruments. Historically, Western pioneers, Civil War soldiers, rural farmhands, street singers, and other resourceful musicians, found ways to build these expressive devices from household items and random hardware.
Samantha Fish has added the cigar box guitar to her sets since 2014. Many musicians throughout the world are currently using them to record and perform live, making the unique instruments and their sound a staple of today’s Roots Music scene.
