Chicago blues group ‘Mississippi Heat’ performs in Traverse City, Michigan on Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 8 PM in Milliken Auditorium. Tickets are $25 advance, $28 at the door and $22 for museum members are plus fees. Tickets may be purchased by calling the Museum Box office at 231-995-1553 or on line at dennosmuseum.org, also at 1-800-836-0717 or MyNorthTickets.com.
Mississippi Heat has recorded ten albums and taken its brand of the blues from Chicago to the four corners of the world. They play heartfelt vintage Chicago Blues, led by world-class harmonicist Pierre Lacocque and lead singer Inetta Visor, a powerhouse vocalist in the Etta James tradition.
Mississippi Heat bandleader and blistering harmonica player Pierre Lacocque came to Chicago from Brussels, Belgium, where he was the only non-Jew ever to attend the Athenée Maimonides school—his Christian minister father felt that he should learn about the suffering of the Jews. As a teenager in Chicago, where his father was teaching theology, he heard a concert by harmonica player Big Walter Horton, and, he recalls, “I was absolutely stunned and in awe.” With that, his future as a blues musician was set.
Inetta Visor joined the band in 2001 after she decided to call the band to offer her services, but as she was looking for the band manager’s phone number, the phone rang and it was the Mississippi Heat manager calling to invite her to join them. Inetta won the Best Blues Singer competition at the House of Blues (Chicago) on July10, 2003.
As for the rest of Mississippi Heat, they are, in the words of the Chicago Sun-Times, “quite simply the hottest band in Chicago”—and in a town filled with great blues bands, that’s saying a lot! Add them to your list of Northern Michigan performances this winter and you won’t be disappointed.