SPRINGFIELD – Curtis Salgado has accumulated a dozen Blues Music Awards. He’s won for Album of the Year, Male Artist of the Year, and B.B. King Entertainer of the Year, among his other honors.
He has no hit records, though.
When he plays on Friday, Nov. 15 at the Wildish Theater in Springfield, there’s one song that’s always a big hit with every audience, so he’ll definitely be playing it.
Salgado said that during a wake for Les Sarnoff, who was a popular morning host of Portland KINK radio, he was inspired to write the song. Sarnoff and his wife were dog lovers, and they played a video highlighting their dog, which reminded Salgado of his dog Chester that he had as a young teenager.
“I wrote the lyrics down in 20 minutes,” Salgado said. “That was one of those songs where the words just came flowing out.”
Salgado, 70, who grew up in Eugene and is a 1972 Willamette High grad, is headlining the 6th annual Springfield Mayor’s Revue which celebrates the city’s culture, arts, and Rotary projects. This year’s signature project is the Tiny Ducks Preschool playground at the Bob Keefer Center. Last year’s project was the ArcPark near Thurston, built for families with children who are incapacitated in some way.
Tickets for next week’s event are $95 and include appetizers and drinks during a hosted reception at 5 p.m. at the Emerald Arts Center. The concert begins at the Wildish Theater with Blind Billy Blue & The Hot Blue Suns opening the show at 6:30 before Salgado takes the stage around 7:30.
Four gift baskets – each valued at approximately $1,200 – will be raffled off during the event. Go to emeraldartcenter.org for tickets and more details. Springfield Mayor Sean VanGordon, SUB, Sanipac, Hayden Homes are helping to sponsor this year’s event.
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Salgado will be promoting his new album, “Fine By Me,” which he says has been getting terrific reviews since its release last July. The highlights on the album are “Gonna Forget About You,” which he performs with Robert Cray, and the title track.
“This is all I know how to do,” Salgado said. “This is totally different from what a guy like Elvis did. Now he was fantastic at what he did, but he didn’t write his own music. What I do is create songs and put them out there and stick them on the internet and I get hired – whether it’s blues, funk, rock, it all comes from the same tree – everyone is cooking their omelet but mine is scrambled differently. I just try to make a living.”
Salgado, who has been based in Portland almost exclusively since 1978, says he grew up with a wonderful family that had music playing in the house constantly.
“I worked on a Christmas tree farm and I probably would have been a forest tree ranger if not for music,” he said. “My mom was an English teacher. I remember coming home from a Boy Scout hiking trip and Ray Charles was singing ‘Let’s Go Get Stoned.’ And then I heard ‘Wild Thing’ by this band called The Troggs. And that’s why I do what I do. So much great music. Who’s Bill Monroe?”
Salgado does what he does because he loves what he does.
“Come and support the community. We want to give you a nice night out,” said Rae LaMarche of Springfield Rotary. “You’re close to the performers, it’s an intimate environment – we invite the community to come out and be a part of it.”
