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It's not the first time that Larry Garner visits Belgium on one of his tours, but this tour there's only one Belgian show scheduled, and it's at the N9 villa. On a monday night, but tuesday's a holiday, so no worries about that. 56 year old Garner was born in New Orleans, but grew up in Baton Rouge. His first musical experience was accompanying a gospel choir, but he became more and more impressed by local bluesmen as Lonesome Sundown, Silas Hogan, Henry Grauy or Guitar Kelly and - against his parents will - he also started playing the devil's music. After his military service in Korea in the seventies, he got a job at Dow Chemical and a steady income. Music was something for the weekends.

But then one day he decided to take his chances as a fulltime musician. In '88, he won a BB King "Lucille" Award, but his big breakthrough didn't happen before '92 after a show at the Burnley Blues Festival in England. It yielded him a contract at JSP records, which released his first two albums. He swapped record companies a couple of times (Gintanes Jazz Label / Ruf Records / Dixiefrog) but has released a total of 8 albums. The years of intensive touring in the US and Europe took their toll when Larry needed a triple bypass last year. But now he's back. Alive and kicking. Larry usually plays relaxed swampblues with lots of soul, just as we like it.