I was invited by Henri after a jam session in the Crossroads café Antwerp and then became part of the 'regulars', the group of musicians Henri rounded up to join him in his annual pilgrimage to Cognac. It was the year 2006.

Across from café Du Canton we made an improvised stage  and jammed 5 days in the French sun with lots of musicians. A lot of them became friends and returned
with us yearly to Cognac.

Each year we improved the staging. Then Bruno van Reeth joined in and supplied us with first class equipment. As a professional sound engineer Bruno knows
how to fix the sound to the level of sheer excellence.

Personally I love to play my DW drums next to Henri's 1963 Hammond organ and I love to explain to the audience in my ' best' French what we do, where we're from and that everyone is invited to join in.

All these years we played with youngsters, professionals, the kids from the local school of music, Belgian, French, Dutch, German friends and more. We all speak the
international language of music with love for the blues.

The Cognac  Blues Passions Festival week is blocked booked in my agenda for sure. As I agreed with my bluesbrother Henri: " we will be coming to Cognac as long as we can breathe!"

I hope to see you all next time and we'll have some fun.

René van den Hoven a.k.a. Onslow the Shuffle king.