Ida McBeth

I had the pleasure of interviewing a great Kansas City singer this week. Ida McBeth has been laying down solid blues, jazz, soul and funk in KC since the late 60s. While she's not well known outside Kansas City, audiences here continue to gather for her regular gigs at Jardine's and the Blue Room.

Here's the feature I put together from our half hour of chat.




She releases her fourth album today. "Live on the Vine" was recorded at the Blue Room at 18th and Vine. While it suffers from the Blue Room's so-often-poorly-tweaked sound system and a few weak song choices, Ida's voice still shines through as the wonderful thing it is.

Personal note: I first caught Ida's act in the late 80s at The Point, a kind of neighborhood joint that has gone they way of the rotary dial phone. The show was always amazing, particularly to a kid who had just drifted out of South Dakota. Between sets, Ida would make a beeline for a stool at the far end of the bar, where she'd wait with her head down until it was time to go back on stage. Turns out that around that time, not only was Ida's mother dying of kidney disease, but Ida and her husband Roy Searcy were going through a divorce. Talk about living the blues.

» To find out more about Ida than I could fit in 5 minutes and 20 seconds (not counting music) check out Tim Finn's profile of Ida from Monday's KC Star.

» And here's a "bootleg" video of Ida and her band at the Corporate Woods Jazz Fesitval doing Willie Dixon's "Wang Dang Doodle."