Tim Childs | Board Member
Raised in the Boston area, Tim’s path to the Blues began after learning how to play BlueGrass & Folk guitar behind friends & family members. As a 17 year old, he went to a Duke Robillard & Roomful of Blues show and witnessed Eric Clapton sitting in with Buddy Guy with Duke joining in and he never looked back.
While attending Ripon college to be near the Chicago Blues scene, he began playing in Blues bands and began his professional playing career. After graduating, this led to him migrating out to the Pacific Northwest, stopping along the way in Nashville, Austin, LA then San Francisco to check the Blues scenes out. Once meeting and witnessing the Portland Blues scene in 1989 – sitting in and meeting the best of the PNW blues bands – he formed the Live Wires in 1993. In this period he realized that being a pro blues musician was difficult to make a living and started working in the construction industry to support the Blues “habit”. Portland was the base, and the Lives Wires started to get a decent PNW following. Things were looking up at that juncture, but Tim’s playing career was sidelined in 2001 with a fret hand injury. It took a very long time to relearn how to play at a high level, and as other BBS board members have also done, the Music career was put in the back ground for a long while, but the love for the blues and the music never was far away. He focused on his General Contracting & Consulting business and retired from that life in 2017.
Then the move to Boise in the summer of 2018 changed everything. By “accident” or perhaps “divine intervention”, Tim ran across an old old playing buddy, and the The Blues Saviors were formed and at the same time – via a BBS Jam – Tim met Dave Light, and most of the current BBS Board members. After playing at several of the BBS sponsored jams, Tim & Dave discussed forming a “West Coast Jump Blues Band”, and the Trials & Tribulations Blues band was formed. Two and a half years later, things are rolling right along and here we are. Way fun being involved with the BBS and playing at a high level once again. Looking forward very much to getting back to a regular playing schedule once “we” get past the pandemic.