Singin’ The Blues

Bradfordville Blues Club makes its mark on the national music scene

By Julie Hauserman

When Tallahassee lawyer Gary Anton first drove down the rutted clay road toward the little music club in the country, it felt like home. The road led to an old cinder block building, and as he stepped out into the starry field, he heard twanging guitar. A bonfire was throwing flickering shadows on hanging Spanish moss. Here, tucked among the fat old oaks, like a scene in some movie: a juke joint.

It was called Dave’s CC Club then, and it drew nationally known blues musicians who did the “I-10 boogie,” travelling across Interstate 10 between gigs in places like New Orleans and Jacksonville.

Anton was drawn to the place’s history and music. He and his wife, Kim, became regular patrons. In 2002, when the owners needed a change, the Antons took over and renamed it the Bradfordville Blues Club.

“We couldn’t let it die — there’s no place like it,” says the 60-year-old Anton, who practices labor and employment law and is an adjunct law instructor at FSU. “Neither of us had any idea we’d still be at it 10 years later!”

Today, the Bradfordville Blues Club continues to draw crowds for blues, roots and Americana music. There’s an eclectic mix of performers: major blues players like Bobby Rush, Tab Benoit, Alberta Adams, Johnny Winter, Charlie Musselwhite and E.C. Scott; touring Americana acts like Eric Lindell, The Mosier Brothers and Blueground Undergrass; and talented local performers like Sir Charles Atkins, J.B.’s ZydecoZoo, jazz trumpeter Longineau Parsons and blues man Bill Wharton (“The Sauce Boss.”) The great Percy Sledge played here. So did Clarence Carter, Pinetop Perkins and Honeyboy Edwards.

Kim is club manager and Gary books the bands. They have just two main employees: a bartender and a waitress.

“We run the sound, clean the toilets, empty the trash, buy the supplies — we do it all,” he says. “We never got in this to make money. It’s a labor of love.”

During the economic downturn, attendance has stayed steady and even increased some, but beer and wine sales have dropped 20 to 25 percent, erasing any chance to make a profit — or break even, Anton says. The cover charge (usually $13 to $15, with a $2 discount for college students) pays for the musicians. Blues-loving volunteers help out with repairs, the website and various other tasks.

“Success here isn’t about money,” Anton explains.

His satisfaction comes from being part of a community and building something unique. Anton is on the board of directors of the national Blues Foundation, which promotes the musical tradition and also finds ways to help musicians with health care. Last year, he helped present three major awards in Memphis to one of his favorite blues legends: the great Buddy Guy.

“I think a lot of people think of the blues as some old guy sitting on a stool, drunker than a rodeo goat, singing about lost love,” Anton says. “But it’s really an upbeat, danceable music that comes from the heart, that comes from the soul. It’ll make you feel good.”

“This place has a great reputation,” he adds, “I don’t have to look for bands anymore. Every day, we probably get six to eight requests from people who want to play here.”

The club started a tradition of getting painters to make table-top portraits of visiting blues artists and having the musicians sign them. There are more than 50 table-top portraits now — many hanging on the club’s walls.

The club was built in 1964, and it sits on a large parcel of land that has had a special history during the past 100 years, Anton said. An African-American family, the Henrys, bought the property in the 1920s, and their descendants still own it. Anton leases the club.

“This land was a community center,” Anton said. “There was a one-room schoolhouse, shops where people sold vegetables and a potato warehouse for storing the potato crops. There was a black baseball team, and they played in a league of teams from other juke joints in Northern Florida and South Georgia. There would be thousands of people out here for baseball games.”

This was during the years of official racism in the South, and local law enforcement didn’t like blacks congregating and partying. The Henry family opted for an unusual legal solution: “They became a country club,” Anton says, “so they could have gatherings with alcohol without the sheriff bothering them. It was the only country club in the state of Florida without a golf course.”

At night, folks would gather around the fire pit and play music. The bonfire is still one of the best parts of a trip out to Bradfordville Blues Club. And you can’t beat the music inside.

Blues clubs, he says, are flourishing in Florida, because musicians like to come south during the winter. Paradise Café in Pensacola Beach, the Funky Blues Shack in Destin, Pineapple Willie’s in Panama City and Mojo’s Kitchen in Jacksonville make a decent North Florida touring circuit.

Some of the older players who show up at the Bradfordville Blues Club will look at it with a big smile. “This reminds me of the place where I got my start,” they’ll say.

Anton says he’s heartened to see younger blues musicians now drawing younger (college-age and 20- to-40-year-old) crowds.

“About half our crowd is younger now, and that’s great,” Anton says. “Kim and I are having the time of our lives. As long as there are enough people coming in and keeping the place going, we’ll keep doing it.”

Q and A with Gary Anton

Q: What are some dos and don’ts of running a music club?

A: If you want to make a million dollars out of a club, start with $2 million.

Q: What are your hard-earned lessons?

A: We cannot compete with the 800-pound gorilla that plays in the fall at Doak Campbell stadium. We see a 40 to 50 percent decrease on game weekends.

Q: What’s your biggest success?

A: Keeping the place open for 10 years! We got the Keeping the Blues Alive award in 2010 from the Blues Foundation. And we got an official Mississippi To Florida Blues Trail marker from the state of Mississippi — there are about 200 markers in the state of Mississippi — we have the only marker in the state of Florida.