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mostly my original tunes. Some of the songs, a lot of my songs have stories attached to them,
so I wasn’t sure if people would understand my accent or find it strange that I was doing what
I was doing. So I went to the competition with no expectations and I just soaked it all in.
Everything was fresh and new and the competition is held in Beale Street, Memphis. Which is a
very historic place for the blues and I was conscious that, for example, I had a song about
Memphis Minnie, a tribute song to Memphis Minnie, and as I was playing it in this bar on Beale
Street, I was aware of the fact that she would have played there back in the day. So it was

really thrilling to get that sense of history and when I ended up winning, I mean, I didn’t know
what to expect so I wasn’t really playing to win. I just sort of thought all you can do is be
yourself and do your best but it made a huge difference to me because I was the first woman
and the first non-American and I was playing in the solo/duo section of the competition and it
really opened the doors for me. It
allowed me to accept offers to go back
to the States and play at festivals and
some major events and really gave me
an entree into the American blues
scene.

BiTS: Was that win the inspiration for
“Lucky 13”?

FB: Well, yes in some ways. I mean, the
first thing that I did when I won was I
came home and plotted to go straight
back and tour for three months, which
is as long as I could get a visa for and so
I went back in 2003, after my win, and

travelled round and just tried to make
connections and meeting people and
jam and use all the connections.
Because as my husband very sensibly
said, it's a bit like being Miss America,
this time next year somebody else will
win [chuckling], so you have a window of opportunity to take advantage of this and see if you
can make some connections. So I did that and that really worked. I mean I did have the chance
then to go back and do more tours in America. But it was three or four years before I recorded
my first American album and I got various offers in the meantime and I ended up making that
first album with a record label called Yellow Dog Records and I’m really glad that I waited for
that opportunity because they were very supportive of me exploring original material and
doing something, even though I had won the Blues Challenge as a solo acoustic player, they
were excited about the idea that I could choose the studio and I went to Austin, Texas and
recorded quite a large band album with original material and fabulous Austin musicians and it
turned out to be a real success. I was nominated that year for a blues music award for best
contemporary album, for my first American recording which is just amazing.

BiTS: Since that time, you’ve won or been nominated for many more blues awards and also
nominated and won things in Australia as well. How do you feel about award ceremonies and
people being, in some sense, declared to be better than somebody else?

FB: [Laughs] Look, it is a strange space and it’s a bit like the International Blues Challenge
itself, which is where it kind of started for me or it certainly was a pivotal point because you’re