Big Joe Duskin Music Education Foundation - Ohio Blues Music Foundations and Associations

Big Joe Duskin Music Education Foundation

Attn: Bill Hulsizer
510 Arrowhead Trail
Loveland, OH 45140
513-505-3541

I was giving Big Joe a ride to the Cincy Blues Society's Blues Challenge one year and decided it was a good opportunity to ask a question I'd been wanting to ask for a long time. "Nobody lives forever Joe. One of these days we'll both be gone. If the opportunity ever comes up where I think I could use your name to do something good, do you mind?" Joe got really serious and said, "Bill, if you can use my name to do anything good at all, you better do it." I laughed and said I was just looking for permission, not a mandate. I definitely did not expect Big Joe to pass away when he did. I expected him to live years longer, like his father did. We're still scrambling a bit, trying to get started, but we're on a mission from Big Joe. We'll get there.

The Big Joe Duskin Music Education Foundation is an Ohio non-profit organization dedicated to preserving the memory and ideals of Big Joe Duskin, who passed away May 6, 2007. Big Joe was quite possibly the premier boogie-woogie pianist of all time. One thing Joe loved to do was perform in-school educational music presentations. He also regularly advised students to study the local professional musicians around them, rather than well known players, to get a better breadth of knowledge. To honor Joe, our foundation has one and only one goal:

"To produce as many in-school educational music presentations as possible, in as many schools as possible, to reach as many children as possible, using local professional musicians."

Most cities today have great local professional musicians. We pay them $100 per person, up to $400 per group, to spend a half day at a school performing and teaching the various styles of music, their history and about prominent artists who influenced the style. We encourage all students to learn to play at least one instrument and work with other local non-profit organizations to help them acquire an instrument and lessons. To do this, we have to raise the money we spend. We have IRS 501-c(3) tax status, so donations are tax deductible. Any and all assistance you could provide in pursuit of our goals would be greatly appreciated. I can be reached at the address below, Bill@BigJoeDuskin.org or 513-505-3541 anytime.