[Dixielandjazz] New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Write-Up

[patcooke77 at yahoo.com]

     I guess I'm getting too old for some kinds of festivals.  I remember when I was a teenager I would walk 6 miles to go to a mardi gras parade, and then walk back.  (This was back when it was safe to walk around New Orleans streets at night).  Now I get too tired to endure a multiple-venue, or an on-your-feet festival.  We played the Jazz and Heritage festival a few years back.  As performers, we had special parking and valets to shlep us and our gear to the stage.  But I never went back.  As a spectator, one has to usually park a few miles away and take a shuttle to the Fair Grounds, where he will walk a few miles outdoors between the various stages, where some performances are outstanding;  others may be gospel, zydeco, R&B, Springsteen, or who knows what.  When you get there, there may or may not be a place to sit.
     The FrenchQuarter Festival until just a couple of years ago,used to be one of my favorite festivals; but now I find myself to be exhausted by the end of the first day.  Parking at the FQF is not too bad if you go early enough (at least 2 hours before the first performance).  You will walk a lot between the stages to see the performers you most want to hear.   And unless you're athletic, better shlep a folding chair.  I used to do the walking, but now it's a chore.   This past FQF, I went the first day and left before the last set.  I showed up the second day, but left by noon.  I didn't even go the third day.
      I still enjoy the Pensacola festival....it's easy to park if you  go a little early, and there is only one venue.  You can sit in the same spot for the entire festival.  In addition to a few student groups, there are usually some world class performers, and always some I haven't seen before.  Also, it's FREE!      
      Jazz festivals (mainly OKOM fesivals) are attended mainly by mature adults.  Creature comfort is more important than at a Woodstock festival.  I now like a festival that is indoors and air conditioned, like in a hotel; and all the venues are in the same building.  I don't want to ride shuttles, or walk great distances outdoors.  But creature comforts alone are not enough....there must be performers that I really want to see.  
 
       Pat Cooke
       New Orleans
      
 - Original Message ----
From: Steve barbone <barbonestreet at earthlink.net>
To: DJML <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Tuesday, May 30, 2006 9:06:48 AM
Subject: [Dixielandjazz] New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Write-Up


Sometimes we can't see the forest for the trees. New Orleans Jazz and
Heritage Festival seems to get panned by most of us on the DJML. Yet it
would appear to be sqauarely in the mainstream of New Orleans Music. Below
are some snips from: "Offbeat", an on line resource for New Orleans Music.
They contain references to Dixieland and/or Dixieland musicians.

e.g. The paragraph about Pete Fountain is wonderful news, as are mentions of
Evan Christopher, Tim Laughlin, a Louis Armstrong tribute etc.

To see the entire article which is very long and very informative, go to:

http://offbeat.com/artman/publish/article_1540.shtml

Cheers,
Steve Barbone



Overheard: Jazz Fest is ³Woodstock with Walkers.²JI

There must be something about Jazz Fest that brings out extraordinary
courage in its older performers. Three years ago, hooked up to an oxygen
tank, Herbie Mann bravely gave his final performance before passing on two
months later at the age of 73. This year it was 76-year-old Pete Fountain, a
recent recipient of quadruple bypass surgery, taking center stage and giving
a stellar performance. It wasn¹t the usual, chatty, ebullient Pete Fountain
of years past, but it was him in the flesh nonetheless  and looking fit and
trim with 50-75 pounds less of it. He didn¹t disappoint anyone who jammed
the Economy Hall Tent beyond capacity that final Sunday, playing some of
their favorites  ³Blues in the Night,² ³Muskrat Ramble,² ³Up a Lazy River,²
³It Had to Be You,² ³The Blues² (with guitarist Alan Young on vocals) and,
of course, his signature song, ³A Closer Walk With Thee.² Joined onstage by
local favorites, Tim Laughlin on clarinet and Connie Jones on trumpet, every
song was met with a standing ovation.DS

When Bruce Springsteen sang ³Keep Your Eyes on the Prize,² began with just
his own voice and acoustic guitar, as if he were performing in a 75,000-seat
coffeehouse. Soon the banjo and fiddle joined in and now the old hymn that
Bob Dylan recorded as ³Gospel Plow² sounded like an Appalachian string-band
number. Then half a dozen harmony singers leaned into their mics and it
became a choir selection. Then the tenor sax, trumpet, trombone and tuba
jumped in and it was a brass-band parade tune. It was a remarkable
demonstration of how New Orleans¹ carnival music and Dixieland can find its
place in what we usually think of as folk music and how easy it is to leap
from one branch of that tree to another.

Members of the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra came into town from all over the
country to perform at the fest. On this day, trumpeter Irvin Mayfield led
the ensemble along with his very young son Irvin Jr., who took his job as
assistant conductor very seriously mimicking his dad¹s every gesture. The
ensemble was stop-on-a-dime tight while loose during solos and in its sense
of enjoyment. Evan Christopher wove his clarinet through ³A Portrait of
Louis Armstrong² and guests such as saxophonist Donald Harrison and
trumpeter Kermit Ruffins jumped in to the swinging affair by set¹s end.GW

In 1970, late in his career, Duke Ellington composed and recorded ³The New
Orleans Suite,² an underrated collection that transformed the raw materials
of Crescent City jazz into sophisticated big band arrangements. It made a
lot of sense that Irvin Mayfield and the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra would
begin their Fair Grounds show with two selections from that suite  ³Second
Line² and ³Portrait of Louis Armstrong²  for this group is trying to
transform the same raw materials into a similar elegance.


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