It will soon be festival time in three Pacific coast resort destinations, all of which will celebrate blues and other music.

The second annual Tequila Blues Explosion Festival returns to Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo after a successful start in January last year.

The festival’s purpose is to build community and provide a world-class experience for tourists, visitors and locals alike.

This year, the festival will be a fundraising event for the Talita Cumi orphanage near Zihuatanejo by helping to give them better facilities to enable them to serve more children.

A lineup of performers from Canada, the United States and Mexico, including two local bands, will present blues, blues-rock, jazz and reggae at the three-day festival, which kicks off January 10 with concerts at the Ixtapa Event Center.

A Blues Brothers Tribute Show kicks things off on the first day, bringing two hours of soul, rhythm and blues and blues music and comedy all based on the 1980 cult status movie The Blues Brothers.

To close off the weekend, the festival will present the Blues Kruise 4Kids Blues At Sea fundraising cruise on the catamaran Picante on Sunday, with festival performers entertaining on board and all-inclusive food and beverages.

Farther south are two other music events.

Blues On The Beach returns to Huatulco, Oaxaca, for its ninth year with concerts on January 17 and February 14.

Dawn Tyler Watson, dubbed Montreal’s “Queen of the Blues,” and Toronto harmonica player David Rotundo are the headliners at the January show; Rotundo will return with harmonica legend Lee Oskar for the second event.

Like last year, both shows will be held at Chahue beach but at a new, larger venue called the Sea Soul beach club.

The festival is a fundraiser for Un Nuevo Amanecer (UNA), a charity that helps disabled children.

The organization receives little government funding and most families of the 100 children who benefit can ill afford to pay for the help they receive.  

The artists who will play in Huatulco will also perform in nearby Puerto Escondido. The Oaxacan Coast Blues runs January 19 and February 16 at the Rotary Club in Rinconada.

Mexico News Daily

UPDATE: This story has been updated to include new information.