Piper & the Hard Times are ‘playing at the top of our game’ after health scare last year
A few days before last year’s W.C. Handy Blues & Barbecue Festival, organizers were notified of a band cancellation, and what appeared at first sight to be disappointment soon was realized as heartbreak for the fans of and the members of Piper & the Hard Times.
The disappointment was that the band was cancelling its performance at the 2025 Handy Festival. But as more was learned, the heartbreak came because the reason the band canceled was that lead singer, Al “Piper” Green, had been diagnosed with colon cancer and needed to take time away for treatment, rest and recovery.
The diagnosis came the first week of June, and guitarist Steve Eagon said it came like a “punch in the gut.”
The band had been speeding on and looking to go faster as their momentum picked up. After Piper & the Hard Times had played Handy in 2024, the band had gone on to pick up a first place in the Blues Challenge, won the Best Emerging Artist at the Blues Music Awards and had a song hit number one on the Billboard Blues Charts for a couple weeks, Eagon said.
They had to pull back on scheduling and cancel a number of shows in summer 2025, one of which was the Handy Festival.
“We didn’t know how long Piper was going to need to address his cancer,” he said.
Eagon said the band was back out on the road in mid- to late-July last summer, though it wasn’t always easy as Piper still had some issues to deal with.
This summer, though, “Piper is feeling great,” Eagon said. Although he’s not cancer-free, Eagon said, “his doctors have managed it really, really well.”
The fear of losing someone close—and Eagon called Piper a brother and the band a family—has put a bit more life perspective into the band.
“It makes you value the time you have on this planet,” he said.
And it has also allowed them to look at a great deal of life’s slights and not let them matter. Eagon said there’s no uproar over the things that truly don’t matter anymore.
“There’s a lot of things that roll off your back,” he said.
But one thing that’s not changed is the band’s drive to succeed.
If anything, Eagon said, “it’s lit an even bigger fire under our bellies to see how far we can push this thing because ‘Why not?’”
Now the band values every minute together and there’s a sense of urgency and a need to get every ounce of the time spent together to produce good music.
The result is good news for Handy Fest and blues fans.
“We’re back in a groove. Everything is clicking right now,” Eagon said. “The band is playing at the top of our game, by far.
“The momentum is back.”
The 35th annual W.C. Handy Blues & Barbecue Festival starts 5 p.m. Wednesday at Audubon Mill Park. Nashville-based Piper & the Hard Times play the Handy Festival at 7 p.m. Wednesday.
