FEBRUARY 2, 2010 Back from a very successful show for the US Embassy at the US ambassador's residence in Paris. Lurrie Bell and I had a lot of fun hanging with some of the most powerful politicians in France and performing at their reception for all of us who were involved in garnering the Grammy nomination for Chicago Blues A Living History.  http://france.usembassy.gov/events100204.html    Lurrie and I are now hard at work on Lurrie's next CD project which I am producing. FEBRUARY 2, 2010 News Flash: Grammy update...well we didn't win. But we would like to congratulate Ramblin Jack Elliot. Almost 80 years young he is indeed a Folk music legend...well, off to Paris.  JANUARY 27, 2010 Well here we are on the eve of the Grammy Awards and my brother Larry, John Primer, Billy Branch and I will be representing the Chicago Blues A Living History project on Sunday the 31st at the awards . We have been invited by the French Embassy in Los Angeles to attend a cocktail party being thrown at the Embassy in honor of all the French participants in the Grammy Awards. You see Chicago Blues A Living History was executive produced (funded) by a city 20 minutes outside of Paris called Aulnay-Sous-Bois. This is BIG news in France and so the Mayor of that city is coming to the Grammys along with a major French television network. Then on the 4th of February Lurrie Bell and I will be performing at the residence of the American ambassador to France in Paris for a celebration in honor of the Grammy nomination (or if we win: Grammy award!)  and the success of this historic project. So keep your fingers crossed . In other news Living History has been slated to headline the Chicago Blues Festival on Saturday June 12th. It has won the very prestigious French Academy of Jazz Award for best blues album of the year and has been nominated for 2 Blues Awards: Album of the year and best traditional blues album of the year. We also took best Traditional blues album of the year at The Blues Blast Awards held here in Chicago by the Illinois Blues Society. As an ensemble all ten of us musicians involved in this are becoming Chicago Blues Ambassadors to the world as we are currently being booked all over the globe. As gigs become confirmed I will keep you up to date. DECEMBER 16, 2009 Hi everyone. Welcome to my new web site! It has been a very busy couple of years so here are some highlights: I produced and played on Lurrie Bell’s award winning CD Let’s Talk about Love. We will have a link on this site to all the rave reviews and awards this release received. I am currently producing another Lurrie Bell CD for Aria B.G. Records. Also…Chicago Blues A Living History been nominated for a Grammy!! You see I collaborated with my brother Larry Skoller (producer and guitarist extraordinaire)  on the now Grammy nominated, historical project, Chicago Blues A Living History.  I lent my production experience, knowledge of Chicago Blues history and my harmonica to this project that is now being hailed by critics as one of the greatest Chicago Blues events of our time.  I am deeply gratified to be part of a project of this magnitude. The project features Billy Boy Arnold, Billy Branch, Lurrie Bell and John Primer. An all star band: Billy Flynn, Matthew Skoller, Kenny Smith, Felton Crews and Johnny Iguana, with cameos by Carlos Johnson and Michael Avery. In July we played 16 festivals in 7 European countries together – what a tour!! Highlights to be posted soon. If you’re wondering why there are not a lot of recent gigs, I just underwent vocal fold surgery and I have had to keep my big mouth shut for a few weeks. But it was very successful and I should be better than new by the 1st of the year 2010. I was featured with Johnny Iguana on a segment of Samantha Brown’s Passport to Great Cities TV show on The Travel Channel. The Matthew Skoller band headlined Buddy Guy’s CD release party at Buddy Guy’s club and hosted a jam that night with Buddy Guy, Jimmie Vaughan and the pre-pubescent guitarist Quinn Sullivan. I recorded a segment of Speakin’ of The Blues at the Harold Washington Library with an interview with Christopher Popa. This television program airs on local cable channels. In 2008 we returned to Rabat, Morocco to play The Mawazine Festival for the second time! The other American acts were George Benson, Al DiMeola and Whitney Houston. We were in great company!! The last 3 years has also seen the birth of Family Tradition Cognac. This is a company formed by my brother Larry Skoller, his wife, Nadege, and me. We have organized several families who make estate bottled, artisan cognac. As many of you know, Larry is a great guitarist who played in my band up to the second time we played The Blues Passions Festival in Cognac, France. He stayed there, married Nadege, made me a niece (Julia) and we formed this enterprise. Our cognac is available in Illinois through Fine Vines in Melrose Park (importer/distributor) and Michael Skurnik Wines imports and distributes it in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Here is a link to our web site: www.familytraditioncognac.com