2023 International Blues Challenge

Biggest Blues Competition in The World

January 24th – 28th, 2023

The International Blues Challenge represents the worldwide search for those blues bands and solo/duo blues performers ready for the international stage, yet needing that extra big break. Each Affiliated Blues Society of The Blues Foundation has the right to send a band and solo/duo musician(s) to represent its organization at the IBC. Winning artists receive career-changing bookings and publicity to help propel their careers forward. Thousands of blues musicians, industry, and fans gather on Beale Street each year for the biggest blues competition in the world.

Takes place in various clubs on Beale Street

The Blues Foundation, is world-renowned as THE organization dedicated to preserving blues music history and celebrating recording and performance.  The International Blues Challenge is the Blues Foundation’s signature event that turns all of Beale Street into a five-day big blues venue for more than 260 blues acts from around the world.

Five days of Blues on Beale

The 2023 International Blues Challenge will be the 38th year of Blues musicians from around the world competing for cash, prizes, and industry recognition. The world’s largest gathering of Blues acts represents an international search by The Blues Foundation and its affiliated organizations for the Blues Band and Solo/Duo Blues Act ready to take their act to the international stage. 

Finals at the Orpheum Theatre

Acts fill the clubs up and down Beale Street for the quarter-finals on Wednesday and Thursday, the semi-finals on Friday and the finals at the Orpheum Theater on Saturday.