blog post Take a tour of Canadian roots and blues festivals

I see you have (rightly) left out the no-longer-very-bluesy Ottawa Bluesfest.  However, I believe the spin-off festivals it inspired in Thunder Bay and Windsor/London are still going strong under different management, for good music in Ontario in early July.  I was also surprised you left off the Southside Shuffle in Port Credit (Mississauga, just west of Toronto), which is well known, though I haven't got there yet myself.

And, of course, most of the major cities have at least small festivals.  Toronto's got a free one for the first weekend of June. 

There's a one-day fest in Burnaby (next-door to Vancouver) in August that varies between mostly roots and mostly blues.  They haven't released this year's line-up, but the 2009 edition was one of the best days of music I've ever had, and 2010 and 2011 weren't bad, either. 

And if the main Edmonton blues festival sells out before you get there, a group in Beaumont, just out of town, has a festival a week later, over Labour Day weekend.  Instead of trying to get big name American acts, they make a point of booking an all-Canadian lineup.  We had a great day there last year.

Finally, the Saskatchewan Jazz Festival (last weekend of June and first weekend of July in Saskatoon) manages to slip in a decent amount of blues and funk bands.  Over four days spent there last summer, I think I only caught about three non-bluesy acts.  This year's schedule doesn't seems quite so bluesy, but still includes a number of options for open-minded blues fans.