Boogie Boy’s trade mark is his jovial and bright look at the world. His charisma and contagious vitality make loved by everyone. With Paul Ambach, also known as “Boogie Boy”, you got a born performer. An extraordinary fellow, a real blues pianist who always surrounds himself with magnificent musicians which follow him in those strong vibrations.

On stage he feels at home and has no restraints. A concert of Boogie Boy has the sensation of a train. That also goes for the audience, so you will see! In his career of almost 40 years, he played at innumerable festivals like: North Sea Jazz/ Montreux / Juan-Les-Pins/ Bratislava/ Orléans/ Corsica/ … On the piano he accompanied big names like among others B.B. King, John Lee Hooker, The Kinks, Lionel Hampton, Alvin Lee. He made a live recording in Singapore with amongst others Leroy Jones. In 1997 he was named Cultural Ambassador of Flanders.

Paul Ambach studied at the Royal Secondary School and continued his studies at the Higher Institution of Translators and Interpreters . Even as a student, he already organized concerts: he brought amongst others Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker to the Sudents Since 1973, he organizes these events professionally and he brings a lot of big stars to Belgium; The Stones, James Brown, Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson and many more…

Now he works under the flag of Live Nation Belgium to bring the big names to us. Music has been in his blood since he was a boy. His grandfather was a Klezmer musician and a piano tuner in Poland. During the war, his father was a tenor in the opera of Lyon and managed to stay alive this way. When he was still very young, Paul got classical piano lessons, but when he discovered Ray Charles at the age of fifteen, Rhythm & Blues became his biggest passion! Ray Charles’ way of piano playing and his voice, gave Paul Ambach his first musical kicks. He changed his classical way of piano playing and discovered that he could lose all his feelings in the grooves and the blue notes of Rhythm & Blues.

Already at the age of 16, he had released something, he has a therapeutic need for until today: expressing his soul. Call it soul, feeling or whatever, to Paul Ambach it’s just a synonym to music: every other genre is unnatural and you don’t have to ask him for it. Paul Ambach has never forgotten that lesson from his youth, that first musical experience. He got deeper and deeper into the world of blues and soul and when he organised a concert for the student movement during his studies as a translator, he surprised everyone by bringing the legendary John Lee Hooker to a stage of a deserted cinema. It was great: a full audience, a good atmosphere and he also made some money out of it.

It didn’t stop there.Paul Ambach got the chance to let James Brown perform in Belgium. He borrowed money, he went here, there and everywhere, he walked his legs off. It worked. The prospective interpreter, who was studying English and Spanish to be able to work for the UN, discovered a gap in the market and became a promoter of concerts.

DISCOGRAPHY

DVD: BOOGIE BOY!
MY TRIBUTE TO RAY CHARLES

Carlo Schreiber

web :  http://www.boogieboy.be

Boogie Boy is the name, Music is the game