Blues and rock at the Apex this month from four women

Three Ladies of the Blues will perform at The Apex, on March 27, closely followed by blues-rock guitar prodigy Chantel McGregor on March 30.

Connie Lush, Erja Lyytinen, Kyla Brox come together on March 27 for Ladies of the Blues.

Connie Lush is regarded as one of Britain’s finest blues singers. Five-times winner of UK’s best female vocalist and twice European Blues vocalist of the year, Connie has wowed audiences from Moscow to LA, and toured the UK with the late, great BB King.

Named “the Finnish slide goddess” by The Blues Magazine, singer/guitarist Erja Lyytinen plays traditional blues blended with contemporary influences and was voted “Best Guitarist” at the European Blues Awards 2017.

Kyla Brox’s voice is a stunning example of the soul singer’s art – turning up the heat by degrees, lulling and charming before unleashing emotional catharsis, and blurring the distinction between pleasure and pain like the soul greats of old.

Chantel McGregor, pictured above, stunned The Apex audience with her guitar virtuosity, on her two previous visits. Now she’s back on 30 March to showcase her own style of contemporary rock-blues. She has won five British Blues Awards in the last three years, including Guitarist of the Year in 2013 and 2014 (the first woman to do so).

A guitar prodigy, at 14 Chantel was told by major labels that she had a “great voice, but girls don’t play guitar like that!” Wisely ignoring the comments, she went to Leeds College of Music and became the first student in the college’s history, to achieve a 100% pass mark, with 18 distinctions.

Her album ‘Lose Control’ saw an exciting pantheon of rock crescendos and riffs that will please her devout blues rock fan base, but also displayed a bigger and bolder rock sound.