Notes – DELTA WIRES – Searching for a Woman
The DELTA WIRES band was created out of a love of the blues, its beginnings in the Mississippi Delta, and the migration to Chicago of the Delta bluesmen. Band leader, Ernie Pinata, started the band as a college project for sociology credit. It was a musical presentation with dialog, which followed the regional migration of the blues from the South [after the Cotton Gin came about] to Chicago, He wrote songs and received poetry credit. These studies culminated in the first performance of the DELTA WIRES
It began with traditional field hollers, to Son House, Charley Patton, and Robert Johnson, along with a few of Ernie’s original compositions. A Muddy Waters-style blues band (or a “Little Walter style band with a sax added”) finished out the program. Ernie Pinata and his brother Stephen worked together on creating the concept and the band which performed the project, and Ernie’s childhood friend, bassist Tom Gerrits, became a part of the band around this time. A three-piece horn section was added and has never left.
The band started by playing the clubs in Oakland – Esther’s Orbit Room and The Continental Club, and Mandrake’s and The New Orleans House in Berkeley. Around this time, Lowell Fulson sat-in with the DELTA WIRES at the New Orleans House in Berkeley, and Ernie sat-in with the Freddie King Band at Mandrakes in Berkeley. This was followed by performances with Freddie King, Buddy Guy and Junior Wells, Bo Diddley, John Lee Hooker, and Little Milton. The Delta Wires then began to open shows for these blues greats, and continued to grow as musicians and as a band. In 2025, they are even more skilled, and still going strong.
Ernie was a blues lover and collector, and an avid fan of the “Chitlin’ Circuit”. He was able to see many of the blues greats when they came to the Oakland / Bay Area. The band has stuck to its roots, always influenced by Chicago Blues (with a horn section). Ernie has wanted to do Albert King’s “Searching for a Woman” and wanted it to be a tribute to Chess Records, as the importance of the music that came out of Chess cannot be underestimated. He wanted to put our own spin on a Classic Chess recording – Searching for a Woman.
“Searching for a Woman”
Recorded January 2025 at 2200 Studios, Sausalito CA (formerly The Record Plant)
Producers: Pinata / Gerrits / Bowman
Recording and Mixing Engineer: Sean Beresford
Mastering: Jason Haxton Productions
Musicians:
Ernie Pinata: vocal, harmonica
Richard Healy: guitar
Tom Gerrits: bass guitar
Anthony Malfatti: B3 organ
Tony Huszar: drums
David Bowman: trombone, cimbasso, horn arrangements
John Christensen: trumpet
Caleb Murray: tenor and baritone saxes