Please Help Win Win

Hi everyone my name is Win Noll, and I'm the lead vocalist and songwriter for Win Noll and the Rockin’ Souls. The Rockin’ Souls and I recently won the Chicago Blues Challenge for the best group, and now we will be headed to Memphis to represent Chicago at the International Blues Challenge! We are beyond excited to be a part of this journey!

The Windy City Blues Society crowns the winners of the Chicago Blues Challenge. One Band, One Solo or Duet and a youth group. The winners travel to Memphis in January 2023 to represent Chicago and compete against the rest of the Blues World in the International Blues Challenge.

The Rockin’ Souls are truly extraordinary, collectively, and individually. They are, myself, Win Noll, Stephen Bass, Minoru Maruyama, Shoji Naito, Seiji "Wabi" Yuguchi, and Mike Flynn. All members are well-established on the Chicago blues scene, playing with many of the greats including Billy Branch, Mary Lane, Lindsey Alexander, Eddy "The Chief" Clearwater, just to name a few. Shoji and Stephen were long-time band members of the Eddy Clearwater band playing and touring the U.S., Europe, and Canada.

I had the privilege of performing at Eddy's last show at Buddy Guy's Legends in Chicago, where Eddy said “Welcome to the blues Win." As you can imagine, those words provided tremendous encouragement for a newcomer. That's the magic of the Chicago blues scene, paying it forward. I've experienced this amazing generosity with my friend, mentor, and Chicago blues legend Miss Mary Lane, inviting me on stage she taught us all that “If you don't love the blues, you've got a hole in your soul!”

I share these stories and am reminded of how very fortunate I am to be a part of the blues community, with my band family “The Rockin’ Souls.” With the lineup we have now, the positive energy we have is through the roof.

But…

We need your help. Our six-piece band has quite a task ahead covering expenses for the week-long journey to Memphis. We need to cover travel, meals, and lodging. Then for the competition to cover costumes, hair, make-up, and performance fees for the band.

Then, we are also planning to hit the studio. Get ready for new music dropping soon with two new singles released during the IBC's. We need help covering the cost of studio recording time, engineering, mixing, mastering for cd, and digital versions, along with fair and industry-standard studio musician session fees.

Our website needs some serious love… we want to upgrade our site with a new, modern, e-commerce website that becomes a digital platform for sharing our music with all of you. This includes website design, graphics, production, hosting, and email services. We’re planning release campaigns for the two new singles, our spiffy new digital platform, and getting the word out about our great new band. We’ll need artwork/design/layout, radio, press promotion and publicity, and some manufacturing.

Our goal is to raise $10,500, which will cover the cost of our Memphis trip to compete in the finals of the International Blues Competition, hitting the studio to record two new singles, building a website, and a professional promotion and advertising campaign to share our new band with you and the world.

We would like to thank the Windy City Blues Society for its generous support and sponsorship. We couldn't have done it without them. They have a great website you can visit: windycityblues.org. Help support the blues, it's good for the soul.

Other Ways You Can Help

Even if you're not in a position to help financially, I'd LOVE for you to spread the word about this new project. So please make some noise!

We would like to thank all of you in advance for any contributions made. Realize, that you are now a big part of our success story. We’ll keep a tab on all of you who donated to make sure you get all the behind-the-scenes pics and videos, and VIP treatment while we’re out there. We will shoot personal videos just for those who are making our tour, and our dreams come true! We love you!!!

Please join us on our journey, as we head to Memphis. And then, the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars!