Rich Baldwin has been a member of BaZa since the early days as Stratton Hill Blues & our first CD “Raisin’ the Rafters,” through our latest recording “Good Time Blues” as BaZa. Rich, our bass player and “low down” vocals man, is also our innovations guy—keeping us moving ahead in sound equipment.

“Through all kinds of weather and everything we done” Billy, Rich & Doug have had great times, made great music and shared some laughs. Now, for personal reasons, Rich is choosing to “sit this one out.” As he has been doing, hopefully, he’ll still review & encourage his blues brothers.

Our concept of BaZa is “a house party or jam” and everyone is welcome to come in, take a seat and play. This house has no closed or locked doors, only revolving ones, particularly for someone who has helped shape our sound the way Rich has done. He remains our friend, buddy and bass player. We love you, man.

Geof mentioned I haven't done a blog entry in some time, sorry about lagging behand, hope everyone has had a great summer. If you have followed our gig list Baza has been doin a few gigs around town, including, Summer Fun at Greeley Park, Fat Daddy's Cafe, Wicked Wine and Brewfest, Steppin out for Seniors in Lowell and coming up on Oct 1st Saints Medical Center's annual Cancer Walk also in Lowell.  Geof and I have also been out playin some open mics in the area, most recently we were up to 900 Degrees Pizzeria in Manchester on Sunday. This is a great venue offering Dogfish IPA on tap and unique and tasty pizzas. The open mic begins at 5pm every Sunday and seats fill up fast.

Baza would like to thank George Panousis for handling bass duties the last 3 gigs. He will join us for the show at Saints on Oct 1. If you haven't been out to see the band in a while, we have new music, original and of course classic blues, suited for our new 4 piece line-up featuring Geof on the Mississippi saxophone (harmonica).

Keep us in mind if your planning a houseparty or any event where music is needed.

Hope you've had a chance to check out our videos taken at tha BACHA showcase and Wicked Wine. All are on facebook or you tube.

Have a great fall, hope to see you soon!

Doug/Baza

Hoping you all are still checking into the site, I just reworked it this week, in an attempt to give it a fresh if not different appearance. As of late we have been on hiatus for personal reasons, but things are starting back-up. This Sat, 5/7 we will be playing a private b-day party in town for a friend/fan of the band. I have been writing/composing new music that Baza will start working-up soon. Trying to stay true to our sound but not sound the same is not an easy task. We will playing Greeley Park, Thursday June 30th 7:30-9pm, bring lawn chairs. I've been doing some open-mikes with our good friend and supporter Geof Goodell. Geof plays the "Mississippi Sax" better known as the harmonica and we have been working up some serious Delta grooves together. Look for him to join the band on stage at Greeley Park. Recently received a great review of the CD from Peter Braidis over at Indie-Music.com, go over and check it out. He nailed it by saying the band must of spent some time on the Bayou. Although most folks know I am from the chilly northeast my musical direction/divertion lies somewhere south, where the muddy waters flow and the blue winds blow across fields of cotton and low-land swamps.  I'm going crazy for some playing, these times are ripe for the Blues and I love to juke. Hope you all can make the Greeley gig and bring some friends.   Doug

As the title suggets, it's been some time since I have shouted out to everyone.  As you may have noticed there's been lots doing at "Camp BaZa."  The new CD "Good Time Blues" is out, if you haven't scored a copy you can purchase downloads at several sites including, cdbaby.com, itunes, amazon mp3, digstation.com and from our web-site. If your local drop an email and one of the ol' Bluesmen will getcha one.  The CD is also on several internet radio sites for listening pleasure including, jango, indie-music, reverbnation and imradio, criuse over to one of those and give us the old thumbs up. This puts us up in the ratings and gives us more plays. One of the most exciting features of the internet play is "globalization."  We now have listeners "All over the world" some as far away as Turkey, South America, Belgium and Japan to name a few.  In the days before internet (yes I'm that old) an indie artist like Baza had a limited listening audience that usually did not reach beyond the boundries of their gigs.  Today, we are reaching the world, crossing borders, and sharing are music with anyone and everyone who owns a computer with internet access. We are receiving emails from many of these folks expressing their thoughts about the music and in turn we are saying thanks for listening.  We are "bridging" closing the gap and making new friends. So keep listening and please listen to other indie artists, we need your support, for some this is our pay-back, we play, you like, we like you!

The band has been very busy! We finished mastering the CD (9 original songs) last week at Night Train Studios and now we are moving into the final production stage of sending all the materials i.e. photos, artwork, completed CD etc to Discmakers for replication and design and printing of cover. We have a store up and running on our web-site, where fans can buy individual tracks and we are in rotation on Jango.com. Oh, we also entered "Hurricane Road" in a songwriting contest. I personally work on the web-site, write e-mials to fans and friends and keep track of stats of song-plays on Jango. I am also working on new song ideas, practicing and getting the band ready for upcoming gigs. All this is time consuming, but when I get on line and find we have even just 1 more fan, or someone from Brazil, Japan or Brazos is listening and taking the time to drop a line it brings a smile to my face. This is why musicians play, so others will listen, enjoy and smile. It might seem like alot of work for little monetary gain to some but hey it's a life!

I recently answered a communication on the Bandzoogle web site regarding "older musicians".  At 55 yrs old, I would guess I am in that category. I have been playing guitar since the summer of my 13th year, do the math. And, although I am not winning grammys and selling millions of CD's, I'm still playing, recording and maybe most important still learning.  Learning from young and old. That's the gift, that you can still do it. "It" might be music, dance, art, acting, whatever tickles your "G" string (sorry couldn't resist). I graduated from the Musician's Institute (GIT) in the early 80's and this was the wisdom one of my instructors imparted on me: He said, you might not make your living playing music but you will have it for the rest of your life. This I have never forgotten, after raising 3 children, working as a registered nurse, and owning a home, I still play guitar, write music, record and perform. I love it and yes I still dream! Doug

As the title suggests I am just gettin started.  So let's start with the music we play, write and record.  Baza started as a Blues band, playing Chicago style blues. We play this music, one because we like it and two because we play it well.  It works for us, do we have other styles and bands we like yes, but the blues is home. I (Doug, guitarist/vocalist) grew up listening to rock and roll from the 50's and 60's, The Rolling Stones, Animals, Chuck Berry, Creedance Clearwater Revival, The Rascals. I also loved R&B and Soul, The Temptations and James Brown to name a few. Like millions of other people, my first introduction to music was from the television watching shows like Ed Sullivan and Dick Clark's American Bandstand. As I got older and started playing guitar I became interested in the origins of this music called Rock and hence discovered it's father, The Blues. Wow, this was the real thing nitty, gritty and low down dirty. I can still remember hearing Big Mama Thornton singing "Hound Dog" and thinking Elvis ain't got nothing on Mama. There was something about the raw sophistication of this music that spoke to me and the further back I went to its roots the more I loved it. I have never tired of listening to and attempting to play like those early blues artists, who among my favorites are Robert Johnson, Charlie Patton, Blind Blake, and Blind Boy Fuller. I also listen to several contemporary Blues artists like Taj, Ry Cooder, Bonny Raitt and Keb Mo. The developement of the blues and how it spread and grew from the Delta and Piedmont regions to Chicago, Texas and all other parts of the U.S. and Europe and how each artist has interpreted it, has kept it alive and vibrant.  It is with this spirit that we as a band have developed our sound. Whether we are playing a version of a classic blues or writing our own song, it is our individual experiences and musical pasts that we draw on.  I know from the many years we have played together and from our conversations that Billy and Rich (drummer and bassist) are huge Beatles fans and that influence has it's mark on our music as well.  So there we go, this is where we are coming from as a collective as a band as individuals. When we go into the studio or on the stage we draw from our past and twist it to create our own unique and individual sound. I hope you like it, I hope you will write back. Did I mention my earliest influence was Ricky Nelson! Thanks Doug