Tab Benoit Brings "Soul of the Swamp" Tour to the Mahaiwe

July 12, 8pm | Great Barrington, MA | $35–$55

Tab Benoit was born in Houma, Louisiana in 1967 and learned to play blues the old way—hanging out at the Blues Box, a music club in Baton Rouge run by guitarist Tabby Thomas, playing alongside Thomas, Raful Neal, Henry Gray, and other living blues legends. He brings his Soul of the Swamp Tour to the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center on July 12, with opening act Sgt. Splendor.

Benoit's Cajun-inflected blues-rock sound recieved international notice on 1992's Nice & Warm, his debut album, which prompted comparisons to Albert King, Albert Collins, and Jimi Hendrix, while his voice drew comparisons to Otis Redding. He spent the following decade playing 250 shows a year across the US, Canada, and Europe, releasing a string of records for Justice Records and then Vanguard and Telarc.

Then, in the early 2000s, something shifted. As a teenager Benoit and his father had flown small planes, and he later flew pipeline patrols over the Louisiana delta, watching it change week to week—a patch of marsh becoming a bay, then open water. Following the release of Wetlands in 2004, Benoit founded Voice of the Wetlands, a nonprofit natural preservation organization, and assembled an all-star band featuring Cyril Neville, Anders Osborne, George Porter Jr., Big Chief Monk Boudreaux, and others to use their platforms to spread the message.

His activism earned him trips to testify before Congress and gigs at both the Democratic and Republican national presidential conventions, as well as the 2009 Governor's Conservation Award from the Louisiana Wildlife Federation.

Benoit stopped recording for 14 years to devote himself to protecting Louisiana's wetlands. In 2024, he returned with the self-produced "I Hear Thunder" on his own Whiskey Bayou label—his first recording in over a decade, and by all accounts a return to the rawness of his best work. True to his approach, he performs without effects: just a guitar, a cord, and an amp.

Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, 14 Castle St., Great Barrington, MA. Tickets $35–$55 at mahaiwe.org. $15 for ages 30 and under at the box office. Members receive $5 off.