Beareather Reddy, vocalist/songwriter/actress/producer, radio host; a native of Sylvania, Georgia, received a B.A. in performance arts from the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Ms. Reddy moved on to New York where she began to nurture herself as an entertainer. A performing arts career spanning over 40 years, Beareather has performed at The Cutting Room, Russian Samovar Room, For My Sweet, Sweetwater’s, Two Steps Down, The Duplex, Jazz966, Terra Blues, The Jalopy, Brooklyn Historical Society, Jazzy Jazz Festival, Briggs Farm Blues Festival, Bloomsburg, PA Blues Festival, Port Townsend Acoustic Blues Festival, 1st African American Music Festival – Kingston, NY, “Blues to Bop Festival in Lugano, Switzerland and various community events and fundraisers. She is a Heritage Ambassador for the Brooklyn Public Library. In 2016 she received the “Woman of Distinction” Award, and was inducted in the New York Blues Hall of Fame.
She has worked with great musicians such as Archie Shepp, Max Roach, Avery Sharp, Abdullah Ibrahim, Sheila Jordan, Jimmy Sigler, Gerry Eastman, George Gee & the Jump Jivers, Stanley Banks, Slam Allen and the Alexis Suter Band. She has appeared on ” The David Letterman Show”, ABC’s World News and World News This Morning.
Ms. Reddy, producer of the Big Eyed Blues Festival and the Ocean Hill folk Festival, has presented national and international blues performers to the community, such as Mississippi Blues legend Bobby Rush, Eddy “The Chief” Clearwater, Alexis P. Suter Band, Christone “Kingfish” Ingram, Bill Sims, Solomon Hicks and Guy Davis, to name a few.
In 2017, Beareather Reddy founded the not-for-profit Brooklyn Blues Society, for which the 12th Big Eyed Blues Festival is the first public event.
“By presenting the Big Eyed Blues Festival, I anticipate that more people with very little knowledge of the blues, will learn and appreciate its rich legacy. I am often told by some people that “That’s slavery time music”; or they are religious now and “I don’t live that way anymore”. Blues music is about life; happy, sad and in between. I anticipate by exposing youth and the community to this music and its history, they will understand they don’t have to be ashamed and throw it away and that myself and others will be producing Blues festivals for years to come.”