Five-time Blues Music Award winner arrives in Historic Folsom fresh off 2026 Traditional Blues Female Artist honors and ahead of a new Memphis-recorded album
Sunday’s Powerhouse of Blues will welcome one of the most decorated artists to visit the Historic Folsom stage this summer when Mississippi pianist, vocalist and songwriter Eden Brent brings her distinctive blend of blues, boogie-woogie, soul and Southern storytelling to Powerhouse Pub.
Brent performs Sunday, Aug. 16, at 3 p.m., arriving in Folsom during another milestone year in a career that has taken her from the birthplace of Delta blues to festivals and concert stages around the world.
Earlier this year, Brent was named Traditional Blues Female Artist at the 47th annual Blues Music Awards, receiving the honor also known as the Koko Taylor Award. The recognition followed her 2025 win as Pinetop Perkins Piano Player and added to a collection that now includes five Blues Music Awards.
For Brent, the newest honor carried a personal connection to her Mississippi roots. Koko Taylor regularly performed at the Mississippi Delta Blues & Heritage Festival in Greenville, where Brent grew up watching many of the artists who helped shape her own musical path.
Brent has described receiving an award bearing Taylor’s name as a full-circle moment, recalling how she once sat in the audience watching the blues legend perform in her hometown.
That hometown is central to understanding Brent’s music.
Born and raised in Greenville, Mississippi, Brent grew up surrounded by both music and the culture of the Delta. Her family included riverboat captains, storytellers and musicians, while the region around her offered direct exposure to generations of blues performers.
The Mississippi Delta Blues & Heritage Festival became part of her musical education from an early age. Through the years, the festival hosted artists including Albert King, Koko Taylor, Memphis Slim and other blues greats, while B.B. King made regular homecoming appearances to the region.
Brent also received extensive formal musical training. She studied jazz and was classically trained in piano and voice at the University of North Texas, where she earned a degree in music theory.
But one of the most important chapters of her education took place outside the classroom.
As a teenager, Brent met Mississippi blues and boogie-woogie pianist Abie “Boogaloo” Ames. She initially learned by watching Ames perform, studying his hands and attempting to reproduce what she had heard once she returned home.
Eventually, she asked him to teach her.
The relationship developed into a nearly two-decade apprenticeship, with Ames taking Brent under his wing and giving her the nickname “Little Boogaloo.” Their musical partnership continued until Ames’ death in 2002 and became one of the defining influences on Brent’s piano style.
The pair were featured together in the 1999 PBS documentary “Boogaloo & Eden: Sustaining the Sound,” preserving a musical relationship that helped pass an older Mississippi piano tradition to another generation.
Brent eventually established herself as a solo performer, taking the lessons learned in Greenville onto national and international stages.
Her career accelerated after winning the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge in 2006. Three years later, she earned Blues Music Awards for Acoustic Artist and Acoustic Album for “Mississippi Number One.”
She followed those honors by winning the Pinetop Perkins Piano Player award in 2010 and again in 2025. Her 2026 Koko Taylor Award brought her Blues Music Award total to five, while her career also includes 16 nominations from the organization.
Outside the Blues Music Awards, Brent won the Independent Music Award for Holiday Song in 2015 for “Valentine” and has received repeated recognition from the Blues Blast Music Awards and Living Blues Awards.
Her touring history has taken her well beyond Mississippi.
Brent has performed at the Chicago Blues Festival, New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, France’s Cognac Blues Passions and Norway’s Notodden Blues Festival, along with clubs and festivals across the United States and abroad. She has also become a familiar presence aboard the Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise, where she has frequently hosted the piano bar.
Through it all, the piano has remained at the center of her sound.
Brent’s playing carries the unmistakable drive of boogie-woogie while moving comfortably through traditional blues, jazz, gospel, soul and pop influences. Her vocals bring another dimension, allowing her performances to shift from rollicking juke-joint numbers to more reflective storytelling without losing their connection to the Delta traditions that shaped her.
Sunday’s Powerhouse appearance also comes just weeks before another major chapter in her recording career.
Brent is preparing to release “Things Going South” in September, her eighth studio album and the follow-up to her 2024 release “Getaway Blues.”
The new project was recorded during a February session at the legendary Sam Phillips Recording studio in Memphis and features 10 original songs centered on love and protest. The project is described as a modern reflection of traditional blues while also representing one of Brent’s most rock-driven recordings to date.
Many of the songs were written by Brent’s husband, musician and producer Bob Dowell, who also produced “Getaway Blues.” Dowell is joined on the new project by producer and engineer Dawn Hopkins, who previously worked on Brent’s early albums “Something Cool” and “Mississippi Number One.”
Brent sings and plays piano on the record while Dowell handles bass. The sessions also feature Memphis musicians Logan Hanna on guitar, Robinson Bridgeforth on drums and Tony Thomas on Hammond B-3, along with a horn section featuring Marc Franklin, Dowell and Kirk Smothers. Additional appearances include guitarist Rob Updegraff and percussionist Pat Levett.
The upcoming release continues a recording career that includes “Something Cool,” “Mississippi Number One,” “Ain’t Got No Troubles,” “Jigsaw Heart,” “An Eden Brent Christmas” and “Getaway Blues.”
She has also contributed to recordings by other blues artists, including Grammy-nominated guitarist John Primer, Johnny Rawls and Kern Pratt.
For Sunday’s Historic Folsom audience, however, the awards, recordings and international appearances ultimately come back to the live performance — a piano, a voice and a musical style shaped by a lifetime spent immersed in the blues.
Brent takes the stage Sunday, Aug. 16, at 3 p.m. as part of Powerhouse Pub’s ongoing Powerhouse of Blues series.
Powerhouse Pub is located at 614 Sutter St. in Historic Folsom. The show is for ages 21 and over. Tickets, VIP reservations and additional information are available at www.powerhousepub.com.
Copyright © 2026, Folsom Times, a digital product of All Town Media LLC. All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Photos courtesy of Eden Brent, Bob Steber, Powerhouse Entertainment.
