The benefit concert was produced by Experience Music Project at Radio City Music hall in New York in February, 2003.

Additionally, the Foundation committed the net proceeds from "Lightning in a Bottle" --the concert film that resulted from "Salute to the Blues" -- to help fund the blues grants. The film was produced by Martin Scorsese and directed by Antoine Fuqua and had its theatrical and DVD/CD release in 2004.

Highlights of programs funded include: $8,000 to the Beale Street Caravan for the archiving, preserving and cataloging of a selection of sources materials of its weekly, hour long, internationally syndicated non-commercial blues radio program; $25,000 to the Carnegie Hall Society to support Carnegie Hall's Perelman American Roots program, an educational initiative that integrates the study of American roots music into the middle school social studies curriculum; $15,000 to the Highway 61 Radio Program to secure the future of this twenty-year radio show and build the collection at the world's largest Blues Archive; and $3,000 to the River City Blues Society of Richmond, VA to create a "blues package" that will include curriculum materials, recordings, documents and transcriptions, lyrics, and visual material to be used in the classroom by teachers in a variety of disciplines.

Other organizations to receive funds are: American Roots Music Education ($7,150); Blues Lovers United of San Diego ($10,000); Canada South Blues Society ($9,000); Center for Southern Folklore ($25,000); The Colorado Blues Society ($13,000); Delta Blues Museum ($25,000); Mississippi Valley Blues Society ($6,500); Music Maker Relief Foundation ($25,000); Santa Barbara Blues Foundation ($10,000); and Suncoast Blues Society Inc. ($10,000).

"It has been an incredible experience and a great honor to be able to put these funds to good use and contribute to organizations that devote their time and efforts to the preservation of one of the great American music forms," said Robert Santelli, Executive Director of the Blues Music Foundation. "The Blues Music Foundation is proud to have been joined by so many wonderful and talented artists along the way in this effort as we celebrate the blues and its continued influence and importance in our society."

The Radio City Music Hall concert is recognized by many blues fans to have been one of the greatest onstage assemblages of blues luminaries ever. Both the concert and the film that came from it paid tribute to the blues and presented many of its top performers, including B.B. King, Bonnie Raitt, Natalie Cole, the late Ruth Brown, Robert Lockwood, Jr., Robert Cray, the late Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, David "Honeyboy" Edwards, Gregg Allman, the Neville Brothers, Dr. John, Mavis Staples, and many more.

The Year of the Blues also featured an exhibition entitled Sweet Home Chicago (2004) that was created and curated by Experience Music Project, the Seattle-based interactive music museum that produced the concert; as well as an award-winning seven-part series, Martin Scorsese's Presents The Blues, presented by Vulcan Productions and Reverse Angle International in association with Cappa Productions and Jigsaw Productions. The acclaimed series featured films by Charles Burnett, Clint Eastwood, Mike Figgis, Marc Levin, Richard Pearce, Wim Wenders and Martin Scorsese. -- www.emplive.org