Reader’s Awards:
Female Blues Artist of the Year:
Shemekia Copeland
Male Blues Artist of the Year:
Magic Slim
Best Live Performer:
Bobby Rush
Best Blues Album (New Recording):
Luther Allison, Live in Chicago (Alligator)
Best Blues Album (Historical Recording):
Various Artists, Living Country Blues (Evidence)
Most Outstanding Blues Keyboardist:
Pinetop Perkins
Most Outstanding Blues Harmonicist:
James Cotton
Most Outstanding Blues Guitarist (tie):
Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown and B.B. King
Most Outstanding Blues Singer:
B.B. King
Critics’ Awards:
Male Blues Artist of the Year:
B.B. King
Female Blues Artist of the Year:
Ruth Brown
Comeback Artist of the Year:
Jimmy “T-99” Nelson
Best Live Performer:
Bobby Rush
Most Outstanding Blues Singer:
Little Milton
Most Outstanding Blues Drummer:
Sam Carr
Most Deserving of Wider Attention:
Chick Willis and George Stancell
Most Outstanding Blues Guitarist:
Three-way tie: Roy Gaines, Joe Louis Walker, and B.B. King
Most Outstanding Blues Keyboardist:
Pinetop Perkins
Most Outstanding Blues Musician:
Nutmeg Horns
Most Outstanding Blues Musician (Other Instrument):
Otha Turner, fife
Best Traditional Blues Album, Best Cover Art/Photo,
and Blues Album of the Year:
Corey Harris, Greens from the Garden (Alligator)
Blues Song of the Year:
“Basehead” by Corey Harris
Best Debut Blues Album:
George Stancell, Gorgeous George (JSP)
Best Contemporary Blues Album:
Luther Allison, Live In Chicago (Alligator)
Producer of the Year (New Recordings):
Timothy Duffy
Producer of the Year (Historical Reissue):
Brett Bonner, Living Country Blues (Evidence)
Best Soul-Blues Album:
Tyrone Davis, Call Tyrone (Malaco)
Best Blues Album (Post-War Historical Recording):
Various Artists, Violin, Sing the Blue for Me (Old Hat)
Best Liner Notes:
Brett Bonner, Living Country Blues (Evidence)
