If you've had a chance to listen to Sean on stage it's pretty easy to pick out the influence of Duanne and Greg Allman, but they're just the tip of the iceberg. When Sean was twelve years old he snuck into a bar and got to hear Otis Redding, James Brown and Little Richard live, this would prove to be a defining moment. For many years after that his ears got served up frequent doses of live shows by artists like Jansis Joplin, the Doors, Muddy Waters, Howlin Wolf, Paul Butterfield, Reverand Gary Davis, Bukka White, B.B.King and more. It deepened his love of blues, both pure and rocking, and exposed him to some of the best of the genre from the 1960's and 1970's.
Northwest Audiences may never have had a chance to hear Sean at all without the help of guitarist Gypsy Lou. Lou talked the then retired singer into going to an open mike. An opening spot for the Mount Baker Blues Festival followed shortly and Sean was back in the game.
Sean Finesey has pulled vocal shifts with a variety of northwest Washington performers including Marvin Johnson, Neil Sorenson and Mike Cornell. Last year he actually reverted to bass player for an summer Alaskan Tour of Andy Koch's Badd Dog Blues Society.
You'll still see Sean performing in the expected screaming blues set (a genre he excells in), his real love these days is acoustic blues. It's a much more relaxed setting that can show the blues fan a lot more of Sean's voice than simply it's flexibility and volume. With the volume down, you become aware of Finesey's vocal tone and all the subleties of his phrasing.
Sean still digs the bass, but he doesn't foresee himself ever becoming a guy who sings off the instrument regularly....somewhere along the line he realized that he is what he was meant to be, a blues singer.
(photo by Noona Walton copyright 2003, used with permission)
