One more Jazz Fest 2019 morning drill : get up ... get ready ... slather on sunblock ... get Brass Passes, shuttle tickets, camera, hats, and phones ... decide if rain gear is going to be needed (fortunately today it was a big NO) ... and head down to the lobby to grab some coffee, meet Rachel, and head off to the last day of Jazz Fest.
There were some clouds this morning, but by mid-day the sky was that gorgeous shade of blue one sees down here. When we left the Staybridge for the shuttles at the Sheraton, the temperature was 71 on its way up to a pretty comfortable 79. There was a very light breeze off of the lake as opposed to the Gulf, and the humidity was around 60 to 65 percent. So it was warm for sure. This evening, the temperature was still in the upper 70s.
We arrived at the Fair Grounds well before 11 and breezed through all of the checkpoints. As always on the last day, we thanked everyone and told them we hoped to see them next year. Then again as always, our first priority was food. Today we ended up at Food Area II neighbors.
Food! Soul-food platter with crowder peas and okra with collard greens
Laurie
Had Before: Day 2 in 2015, Day 3 in 2017, and Day 3 last year.
This platter is served up, with rice, by the Praline Connection of New Orleans, who, as you can see does more than make sweets. They opened on Frenchmen Street in 1990 as a delivery and catering service.
While they are famous for their version of the praline, owners Cecil Kaigler and Curtis Moore have since created a much more encompassing Southern food institution that takes one through a tour of Southern soul-food favorites as appetizers: fried chicken livers with sweet hot pepper jelly, hog's head cheese with garlic toast, fried okra, bite-size catfish with cocktail sauce, and fried pickles. And the comfort aspect of Southern cooking is made clear through the entrée options: farm-raised catfish (seasoned, battered, and fried); pork ribs that are slow cooked and finished with the Connection's own seasoning; a stuffed crab dish that is sautéed and topped with a particular blend of spices and seasonings before being lightly battered and deep fried. The crowder peas with okra and rice are a perfect accompaniment to any of these at the restaurant, and they stand up well on their on at Jazz Fest.
Food! Jambalaya
Jeff
Had Before: Day 4 in 2012, Day 11 in 2016, Day 9 last year.
When it's time for the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and the Gonzales Jambalaya Festival, Wally Taillon always has a full plate.
Taillon knows jambalaya. It's the only thing sold at his double-wide booth in Food Area II. He's also president of the Jambalaya Festival Association of Gonzales, which is the self-proclaimed jambalaya capital of the world, and also a world champion jambalaya cook. He's been at Jazz Fest since 2008.
When he's done with the two weekends of at Jazz Fest, he cleans his cast-iron pots and begins to prepare for the Jambalaya Festival, which is held Memorial Day weekend.
At Jazz Fest, Wally and his crew cook and sell around five 40-gallon pots of jambalaya each day. At times the lines to the booth are so long and steady that Taillon has 10 people helping with the booth. "And I need them all," he says.
It's interesting to note, though, that the jambalaya cooked by Taillon at Jazz Fest is not the brown-colored Cajun jambalaya that made Taillon and Gonzales famous. At the time he got the gig, the Jazz Fest people were looking for a Creole-style jambalaya that is red in color, the traditional way of serving in New Orleans. (Catering Unlimited was already selling Cajun-style jambalaya in Food Area I.)
Taillon puts four gallons of tomatoes in each big pot to give his jambalaya the required hue and a slightly different flavor. "I had to bring a sample to their main office to see if it was good enough," he says. That sample for about 25 people was "cooked red" and included one pork and sausage jambalaya and another with shrimp. The pork and sausage was selected, and it has been a fixture at Jazz Fest ever since.
However, Taillon is not the first one from Gonzales to cook jambalaya at Jazz Fest. He shared information about the early history of the Jazz Fest and the Gonzales champion cooks who were there in the early years. "I found an official document from the Jazz Festival in 1969 thanking the jambalya cooks for being part of it," he said. That was 50 years ago, at the first Jazz Fest, in Congo Square, before it moved to the Fair Grounds a few years later.
"The people who come to Jazz Fest like music and food," Taillon says. "Whatever you want to listen to, it's here. And, they have everything to eat, too."
Here are today's cubes. We went our separate ways to start the day, Laurie for some funk, me for some gospel and soul.
George Porter Jr. and Runnin' Pardners
Laurie, at the Gentilly stage
Seen Before: GPJ all over the place, but with the Runnin' Pardners on Day 2 in 2013, Day 11 in 2014, Day 11 in 2015, and Day 8 in 2017.
Best known as the bassist of the progenitors of funk, the Meters, it is said that George Porter Jr.'s DNA can be found in all New Orleans funk. It goes without saying that the Meters have probably had some kind of influence on all modern-day funk bands or at least the bands that were inspired by them. And on the bass, there are only a few as accomplished in the genre as GPJ.
In the Runnin' Pardners, Porter has assembled two of NOLA's most seasoned and talented musicians in Brint Anderson (guitar) and Michael Lemmler (keyboards), and two rising stars in Khris Royal (saxophone) and Terrence Houston (drums). They are tight and funky and a treat to watch. As a group, they are acutely in tune with each other, a direct result of Porter's binding bass line. The group today was augmented by Tracy Griffin on trumpet and Jeff Albert on trombone.
Porter reached back 50 years to play old, familiar songs as well as tunes of a more recent vintage. At one point he told a story about being a young musician schooled by David Lastie of the famed Lastie musical family. "He told me what not to do instead of what to do," he said with a chuckle before launched into "Make Me A Pallet on the Floor." The tune started as a slow gospel incantation and ended as an up tempo funk raver.
Audio/Video: Here's 20 minutes from today's Gentilly stage set, and here are the Munck Music excerpts of every song they did. And for something longer, allowing for even more funking enjoyment, here's two hours from Salvage Station, a club in Asheville, North Carolina.
The Electrifying Crown Seekers
Jeff, in the Gospel Tent
Seen Before: Day 11 in 2017, Day 5 last year.
Could there be a better way to start a Sunday at Jazz Fest than in the Gospel Tent? Led by James Williams, who plays a wicked Jimmy Reed-style blues guitar, this super-cool group often brings a bit of country flavor to their gospel sound.
Originally from Liberty, Mississippi, Williams is the only original member of this group, which has been around for 47 years. He is now backed by members of his large musical family and their community. Their stomping garage-rock gospel, layered with gorgeous four- part vocal harmonies, will move anyone who hears them, but their large contingent of fans wait for the moment in their set when Gregory Sanders takes center stage to sing "Walk Around Heaven All Day" in his distinctive falsetto. It is like nothing you've ever heard.
Audio/Video: Here is my video from today, and here's a full 9 minutes from later in the show, with some great guitar from James Williams.
Brother Tyrone and the Mindbenders
Jeff, in the Blues Tent
Seen Before: Day 9 in 2014, Day 11 in 2015, Day 11 in 2016
Brother Tyrone's songs blend classic soul and blues sounds with lyrics about life in New Orleans, especially the gritty details of dealing with the flood that followed Hurricane Katrina. He watches his records and clothing float out the door in "When It's Gone, It's Gone." With a wife and children shifted to Houston due to the storm, the singer toys with temptations to counter loneliness with a barroom flirt in "If You Ain't Cheating."
Most of the songs today were from the band's 2008 album, Mindbender, which earned the relatively obscure musician more recognition outside of the Tremé and Central City bars where they play regularly. The recording earned friendly reviews from as far away as Europe.
Brother Tyrone Pollard just radiates cool. He struts around the front of the stage, rocking to the beat in his slick shades and bright linen shirt. His grooving is effortless, his laid-back style easily brings the audience along with him wherever his songs may go. He desn't really do any marketing; the music speaks for itself.
The Mindbenders are an awesome backing band, too. Everette Eglin on guitar, Bobby Joe on bass, Gary Nabonne on drums, and the great Tom Worrell on keys are masters at keeping a groove going.
Tyrone's set includes a range of old-school soul, plus "New Indian Blues," a catchy funk jam with rhythmic vocals. The inspirational "Love Brought Me Back" is an organ-heavy song that had his two background singers, members of The Gospel Stars, swaying side to side along with the audience. When the show closes, Brother Tyrone says a quick goodbye, and then casually walks off the stage, leaving it for Eglin and the band to finish up. For him, leaving is as cool as the rest of the show.
That's why I keep going back to see Brother Tyrone whenever I can. It's basically the same show from year to year, but the songs are so good, he is such a great singer, and the band and backup singers are so good that it is just irresistible.
Audio/Video: Here is my video from the Blues Tent, and here is an awesome full set from the Crescent City Blues and BBQ Festival later this year.
Cyril Neville's Swamp Funk
Jeff and Laurie, at the Acura stage
Seen Before: We see Cyril Neville all over the place, and that's definitely a good thing, but with his own band on Day 8 in 2015, Day 8 in 2016, and Day 9 last year.
Cyril Neville is among the greatest singers from New Orleans. His voice epitomizes funk and soul. Today on the Acura stage he had a great band, driven by his son Omari on drums and Daryll Johnson and Tiffany Morris on bass. Greg Molinaro, Mike Melchione, and Joy Clark were the guitarists, Norman Caesar was playing keyboards, and George Cortez-Diaz was on sax. And that's just a few of the people in this fantastic funk band.
The show was plagued by sound problems. And honestly, the entire festival was plagued by sound problems at every stage. I'm not going into specifics, but artists like Cyril Neville and countless others deserve better from a big concert production company like AEG. At times the sound was almost amateurish.
Here's my video so you can see a true New Orleans legend today at Jazz Fest, and here are Munck Music's excerpts of every song in the set.
It's always great to see and hear! For something a bit longer, here he is at the Louisiana Music Factory a few days earlier.
On my way from the Acura stage to my next destination, I stopped by the Jazz Tent to hear a couple of minutes of a tribute to Alvin Batiste, the New Orleans clarinetist and educator who passed in 2007. The band featured many of his former students and many local musicians who he influenced, performing in a band that was led by Herman Jackson, a long-time member of Batiste's whimsially named Jazztronauts. Edith Batiste, Alvin's wife, was on stage throughout and read some of her poetry during the tribute.
Batiste was a man of great intellect and creativity. Not only did he bring the clarinet from traditions jazz into the modern realm, he was also known as someone who brought life lessons and philosophy into his music lessons. He created the jazz program at Southern University in Baton Rouge and often led that school's big band at Jazz Fest.
Check this great modern jazz out in my video. It's a truly special rendering of "The Lord's Prayer" by Herman Jackson and the band. Gregory Agid on the clarinet.
Next I headed over to the Blues Tent to get a dose of Delta blues.
Little Freddie King
Jeff, in the Blues Tent
Seen Before: Only for a couple of minutes here and there, including Day 2 at Jazz Fest in 2012 and at the Rock 'n' Bowl on Day 4 in 2014.
Little Freddie King, drummer "Wacko" Wade, blues harpist Robert Louis diTullio Jr., and Will Jordan on bass are a lean, mean, swampy aggregation of gut-bucket wild bluesmen who can transform even the massive Blues Tent into a back-of-town beer joint.
Born in McComb, Mississippi in 1940, Fread E. Martin grew up playing alongside his blues guitar-picking father (Jessie James Martin), then rode the rails to New Orleans during the early 1950s. There he crossed paths with itinerant South Louisiana bluesmen such as "Polka-Dot" Slim and "Boogie" Bill Webb, whose unique country-cum-urban styles would influence his own.
Honing his guitar chops at notorious joints like the Busy Bee, which he called the Bucket of Blood and later immortalized in song, he jammed and gigged with Bo Diddley and John Lee Hooker, and also played bass for the other Freddie King during one of the guitarist's stints in New Orleans. People began comparing the two musicians' styles, hence Martin's "Little" nom-de-plume. While well-vested in a variety of styles, these days Little Freddie sounds a lot more like his cousin Lightin' Hopkins, albeit after a three-day corn liquor bender! The King sobriquet is fitting, as Freddie King is undeniably the monarch of the Crescent City blues scene.
King is always dressed impeccably, with a distinctive jacket and colorful furnishings. Today's jacket had a blood-red and gold pattern. Whatever the outfit, it's topped by a fedora banded with an etched skull. Often you'll see a skeleton dangling from his microphone stand. We're talking serious Delta blues here!
The best place to hear King on a recording is Sing Sang Sung, a greasy live set recorded in 2000 that contains great New Orleans street poetry like "Bad Chicken" and the aforementioned "Bucket of Blood." In review, Offbeat's Robert Fontenot said, "It ain't pretty ... you can practically smell the Chinese food and chicken coming from Chun King ... the slop bucket wheeze put out on his cover of the King Curtis song "Soul Twist" is potent enough to turn George W. Bush into the Godfather of Soul. It's THAT country and THAT ghetto." And that's about all you need to know.
Audio/Video: Here is my video from my favored standing spot halfway back and along the side of the Blues Tent. As a result the video is shaky as heck, but the music is great. Here are the Munck Music excerpts of all the songs in the set. Here are non-shaky full sets from last year's and this year's Crescent City Blues and BBQ Festival in Lafayette Square.
I was glad to finally see more of Little Freddie King. Old-school guys like him are getting fewer and further between. My next music was back at the Acura stage, a place I don't like to frequent all that often this late in the day, but in this case I made an exception, for obvious reasons.
Tribute to Allen Toussaint
Jeff, at the Acura stage
Seen Before: This was a one-off Jazz Fest at 50 affair. Read my own tribute to Allen Toussaint at Day 3 in 2016.
As Offbeat said, the tribute to Allen Toussaint demonstrated the fact that while Jazz Fest is communal, it is also personal. The Allen Toussaint Orchestra featured musicians who performed regularly with the legendary songwriter over the years, including his son, Clarence, on percussion, Roland Guerin on bass, and Renard Poche on guitar. A parade of special guests included musicians and singers who knew the pianist personally.
John Boutté sang "Lipstick Traces" with Joe Krown at the piano. Davell Crawford was visibly moved as he worked through three Toussaint classics ("Sweet Touch of Love," "With You in Mind," and "Last Train"). Rita Coolidge sang a slow version of "Shoo-Rah! Shoo-Rah!", a Toussaint song that got a great upbeat R&B treatment from Betty Wright. Big Sam Williams added one of his patented trombone runs to that one.
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Toussaint's early 1960's tune "Fortune Teller" has been covered by many bands (including the Rolling Stones), and today Jimmy Buffett did a great version of that one. Then Irma Thomas sang "Two Winters Long." The backing singers, who included Erica Falls, did "Lady Marmalade" (produced for Labelle but not written by Toussaint) before Ivan Neville led a sing-along on "Yes We Can Can," with more from Big Sam. Ivan stayed at the piano as his uncle Aaron Neville hushed the giant infield with a stellar rendition of "All These Things" that featured the original horn arrangement.
Jazz Fest knows how to put these tributes together, and almost all of them are spot on the mark. This one was marred by some more sound problems, but all in all it was an incredible group of artists paying tribute to a great friend.
Audio/Video: Here are my excerpts from the tribute show, in Part 1 and Part 2.
After this performance ended, I walked across the standing area of the Acura stage field so I could take the walkway toward the back and turn the corner to face the end of Food Area II. Anybody who has followed this blog must by now know what is there when it comes to food.
Food! Stuffed Bread
Jeff
Had Before: Day 8 and Day 11 in 2015, Day 8 and Day 11 in 2016, Day 3 and Day 9 in 2017, Day 3 last year, Day 2 this year.
I love this thing so much that I probaly wouldn't mind if it was the only food at Jazz Fest. OK, that's a stretch, but this homemade bread stuffed with a mixture of ground beef, sausage, onions, and spices from the Creole Lunch House in Lafayette is wonderful, as is Ms. Merline Herbert, owner of the Lunch House and the only person I've ever encountered at the stuffed bread food booth.
Next up was the Fais Do Do stage, but I had some time to spare so I stopped in at the Blues Tent for a most fortunate few minutes.
Lil' Buck Sinegal Blues Band
Jeff, in the Blues Tent
Seen Before: Not with his band, but again here and there over the years with other blues and zydeco bands.
I'm not going to sidestep the issue, this great blues and zydeco artist passed away just over a month after this performance. So this is part recollection and part remembrance.
Allen Toussaint dubbed Paul Sinegal, also known as Lil' Buck, "the gentle giant of guitar." When he died at his Lafayette home on June 10, after a lengthy illness, he was 75 years old.
Well known as a versatile, hard-working guitarist whose career spanned six decades, Sinegal played with virtually every South Louisiana R&B, zydeco, blues, and swamp pop artist. He often played with more than a half-dozen different groups during a single Jazz Fest.
"When it comes to the blues, I have to get the guitar out of my face," Sinegal told Herman Fuselier in OffBeat. "Because if I grab one, it's gonna be all day and all night."
As a child, Sinegal was largely self-taught on guitar, developing his talent to the point that he was playing with artists like Carol Fran, Lee Dorsey, and Joe Tex while still in his teens. He later worked as a session artist for Excello Records, a Nashville-based blues label, where he honed his chops alongside bluesmen like Slim Harpo and Lazy Lester, artists he would run into throughout his career.
In the late 1950s, he began playing with a group called the Jive Five, which played on the South Louisiana R&B circuit. In 1962, he fronted his own 13-piece band dubbed Lil' Buck and the Top Cats. Very popular around Lafayette, the group recorded a couple of great contemporary 60s soul singles for Carl Rachou's La Louisianne label, including "You've Got the Power," and the cult classic "Monkey in a Sack".
The Top Cats broke up around 1969. Very soon after, the adaptable guitarist joined Clifton Chenier's popular group, the Red Hot Louisiana Band. The hardest working band in the land, Chenier's group regularly played six-hour sets with the only break being a pause for a sip of Falstaff or to light up a Camel. Sinegal toured Europe and recorded several LPs and 45s with Chenier during the better part of a decade.
"He was the first zydeco guitarist I ever heard," says C.J. Chenier, whose experience with Sinegal dates back to 1978 when C.J. began playing saxophone with his father's group. "He was one of the pioneers of the zydeco guitar sound. He was also a great blues guy because my daddy played a lot of blues and he needed someone like Buck with him because it all went together. He was an all around natural, a great accompanist because he knew exactly what to play and when to play it. He stayed in the pocket until he was called on."
In the 1980s, Sinegal went to play with Rockin' Dopsie's Zydeco Twisters (both Jr. and Sr.) and Stanley Dural's Buckwheat Zydeco band. (Briefly Sinegal and Dural both were in Clifton Chenier's group, in 1979.) In addition, Sinegal often was called upon for studio dates, even playing on Paul Simon's acclaimed 1987 album Graceland.
Throughout this time, however, he was always in Acadiana. On any given night you could find him playing at clubs and dance halls across the region, lending his guitar's unique voice to the evening.
In the 1990s, Sinegal founded the Cowboy Stew Blues Revue with C.C. Adcock. They played every Monday night at Lafayette's Swampwater Saloon (now closed). His gig there attracted several young up-and-coming musicians, including Steve Riley. He became a mentor to these and other musicians, giving lessons to some of the area's current roster of artists. C.C. Adcock's brother, keyboard and organ ace Eric Adcock, learned from him, as did myriad other up-and-coming players.
In the late 1990s, he teamed up with Allen Toussaint, who produced The Buck Starts Here, an excellent CD for the short-lived NYNO label. His most recent CD, Bad Situation, was also great. In later years, he often performed in New Orleans with the equally aesome Barbara Lynn. In addition to Jazz Fest, he was a regular performer at the Ponderosa Stomp.
"He was a real mellow fellow, he liked to joke around and clown a lot," says C.J. Chenier. "He would laugh all the time about everything. Yeah, he was really a gentle person until you crossed him the wrong way and then he would really let you have it," C.J. adds laughing at the memory. "He taught me a lot -- how to live on the road, how to maintain myself and not get in trouble. He was the go-to guy -- always good."
Audio/Video: Here is my video from today in the Blues Tent, and here is a full show recorded at the Blue Moon Saloon in Lafayette a couple of years ago.
I really enjoyed my time with Buck Sinegal and his band this afternoon, and in hindsight I'm really glad that I did. It was certainly not the first time I had ever seen him at Jazz Fest, but it was the first time I heard him in front of a band, and he was as everybody said, a great guitarist and personality.
While I was doing all this, Laurie went over to the Gentilly stage after seeing the entirety of Cyril Neville's performance. Performing there was Little Feat, a band that's been around almost as long as Jazz Fest, although not in its original form since the passing of founder Lowell George.
Little Feat
Laurie, at the Gentilly stage
Seen Before: First time, anywhere!
If there was a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for live albums, Little Feat's Waiting for Columbus would be a shoo-in. All that made the freewheeling roots-rock band from Southern California so distinctive is on those two records.
But Little Feat was probably too fearless and eclectic for its own good, and never quite made the big time. George, the Feat's larger-than-life frontman and driving creative force, flamed out at age 34, dead of a heart attack hastened by his full-throttle lifestyle. After a hiatus, the surviving members reanimated Little Feat and embarked on a new chapter or two or three, and this year they are celebrating their 50th anniversary as a band.
"The first thing Lowell told me was, 'There is only one rule, and that is there are no rules. We'll play any style of music, as long as we do it well,'" guitarist Paul Barrere recalled. (Barrere would pass away later this year.)
"The first two Little Feat records were very eclectic. But then we kicked it more into the blues and the old R&B style, if you will. We were still eclectic, songs like "Fat Man in the Bathtub" and "Two Trains" and things like that. But we added another area of syncopation.
Little Feat covered Allen Toussaint's "On Your Way Down" on Dixie Chicken. The New Orleans connection was strengthened after George worked on Robert Palmer's 1974 album Sneakin' Sally Through the Alley with the Meters at Toussaint's Sea-Saint Studio in the Gentilly neighborhood.
In the late 1980s, the remaining members of the group teamed with Craig Fuller, an alumnus of Pure Prairie League, who took over as primary songwriter and singer. Little Feat's first album with Fuller, 1988's Let It Roll, was a critical and commercial success. Subsequent releases didn't fare as well. After Fuller departed, backing vocalist Shaun Murphy stepped out front. She left in 2009; the remaining bandmembers now share vocal duties.
The lineup today featured Barrere, Bill Payne, Kenny Gradney, and Sam Clayton from the Lowell George years. Multi-instrumentalist Fred Tackett contributed to Little Feat recordings in the 1970s, but didn't officially become a member until 1988. Gabe Ford served as original drummer Richie Hayward's tech in the 2000s, then became Little Feat's drummer following Hayward's death in 2010.
Little Feat doesn't perform nearly as much as in the old days. Some members, including Barrere, deal with health issues. And Payne stays busy moonlighting as the Doobie Brothers keyboardist. He was onstage with the Doobies at the Fair Grounds on April 25, leading that band through "Dixie Chicken."
The Little Feat-New Orleans connection has grown even stronger in recent years. Barrere and Tackett have collaborated with a number of local musicians in Dead Feat, the joint celebration of the Grateful Dead and Little Feat formed by Anders Osborne. This loosely assembled group almost always plays a night show at some time during Jazz Fest. Barrere and Tackett have also been featured at Osborne's holiday spectaculars, and have shared stages with the New Orleans Suspects.
The band very much enjoys that a live album they released more than 40 years ago remains relevant. Waiting for Columbus, like The Last Waltz by The Band, is the stuff of legend. A 2002 deluxe reissue from Rhino Records featured seven previously unissued outtakes, including "On Your Way Down."
The material on Waiting for Columbus was recorded at a series of 1977 concerts in London and Washington, D.C., with the Tower of Power Horns augmenting the band. Most of what is on the album, Barrere said, is what was actually played during the concerts.
"There wasn't a whole lot of overdubbing. There was a couple of vocals, a couple of guitar parts that Lowell wanted to redo. All of Billy's stuff is live; same with Sam and Kenny and Richie. I did a remake of a vocal on "Skin It Back." But for the most part, it was all live. It was a great series of concerts."
Indicative of the album's appeal to successive generations of musicians, Phish performed Waiting for Columbus in its entirety as a "musical costume" on Halloween 2010 in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Phish bassist Mike Gordon "kept calling me asking about what gear I was using for Waiting for Columbus, what kind of pedal, what kind of amp, this, that, and the other thing," Barrere said. "After the third phone call, I said, 'What's going on, man?' He said, 'We're going to do it for our Halloween show.'"
At the 2018 Peach Music Festival in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the jam band moe., along with members of Little Feat, staged a similar tribute. "No rehearsal, let's just hit it and quit it," Barrere said. "And it was good. I love the fact that so many of our peers are doing these things. What a great tribute. It does nothing but gain us more and more of a fan base."
Today's set at the Gentilly stage was "Spanish Moon," "Oh Atlanta," "Honest Man," "Willin'," "Fat Man in the Bathtub," "Dixie Chicken," and "Feet Don't Fail Me Now." Here are Muck Music's excerpts of all these tunes from today's set.
Audio/Video: Here is someone's video of "Spanish Moon" from today at Jazz Fest, and here is an entire 50th Anniversary Tour concert from Red Butte Gardens in Salt Lake City in June of this year. Little Feat concerts in all iterations (900 of 'em!) can be found at archive.org.
Laurie now headed over to meet me at the Fais Do Do stage for awhile, at least that's what she said. When she arrived, though, she had a WWOZ Mango Freeze, which makes me wonder what the real purpose of the trip might have been!
Food! Mango Freeze
Laurie
Had Before: Day 4 in 2012, Days 4, 8, 10 and 11 in 2013, Day 10 in 2014, Day 3 in 2015, Days 3 and 10 in 2016, Day 5 last year.
Perfect on a hot Gulf Coast afternoon, and doubly good because it is sold by and supports WWOZ, the greatest radio station in the nation, this fresh mango sorbet hits the spot every time.
Savoy Family Cajun Band
Jeff and Laurie, at the Fais Do Do stage
Seen Before: Day 10 in 2014, Day 4 in 2015, Day 10 in 2017, Day 5 last year. Plus they were all on stage yesterday during the jam session, and we've seen Ann, Joel, and Wilson with various other groups. In other words, yes, a lot. And why not?
The Savoys are definitely today's first family of Cajun music. Patriarch Marc Savoy leads this band and handcrafts Cajun accordions at the Savoy Music Center in Eunice. The Music Center is home to the weekly jam session that came to Jazz Fest yesterday. Ann Savoy sings in the Magnolia Sisters, an all woman quartet, is active in many other music projects, and wrote the deinitive history of Cajun music in Louisiana.
Marc and Ann's sons are also in the band. Joel Savoy is a award-winning recording engineer and record producer, and plays with any number of Cajun bands. Wilson Savoy is a member of the Pine Leaf Boys and and the Band Courtbouillon and is a filmmaker in Lafayette. Talent abounds. The music is always wonderful and the personalities are engaging. What more could you want on a beautiful afternoon at the Fais Do Do stage?
Audio/Video: Here's my video. We were pretty far back in the crowd, so here are 1, 2, and 3 from today that are from much closer in. Here are the Munck Music excerpts of each song in the set.
Usually at this point, two-thirds of the way through the last day I would be running all over the place, trying to get as much music in as possible, but today not so much. Everybody I wanted to see was at the two outdoor stages centrally located in the Fair Grounds infield, far away from today's very large crowds for the aforementioned Jimmy Buffett (believe it or not, today was the first time I had ever seen the guy) and John Fogerty. The former we're just not into and the latter we have seen before at Jazz Fest and last year at at Wolf Trap with ZZ Top. Today's crowd was probably made even larger by the storms yesterday in the morning and early afternoon in that a lot of people decided to use their tickets today instead.
Now, if you look at the cubes, you might find yourself asking why I wasn't camped out at the Jazz Tent to see Herbie Hancock. A valid question, easily answered by the fact that Laurie and I saw Hancock and this same band at the Strathmore in Bethesda, Maryland, earlier this year. It was a great concert, and we had seats in the center of the front row of the first balcony, so our view was unobstructed, and there was none of that endearing Jazz Fest commotion!
Laurie went a bit further than the center of the Fair Grounds, as she went back to the Gentilly stage to hear some of the Radiators
The Radiators
Laurie, at the Gentilly stage
Seen Before: We have seen members of the Radiators around a lot, but this is the first time either of us has seen the whole band, with Ed Volker at the helm.
One service Jazz Fest has reliably provided is the keep the Radiators an active force in the festival's lineup even after the band stopped performing regularly several years ago. The only other place on earth the Rads sound as good as they do on the Gentilly stage is at Tipitina's, and Sunday's set was a happy reunion for the band's dedicated fans.
From the melodic strains of Volker's "Love Grows On Ya" and "Time to Rise and Shine" to the great new Earl King tribute, "King Earl" and old favorites like "Death of the Blues," "Sparkplug," "Papaya," and "Smoking Hole," the band dazzled in the late afternoon sunshine. Guitarist Camile Baudoin wore his star-shaped stage pass like a sheriff's badge and played authoritatively on a blistering "No. 2 Pencil." And the Radiators made sure they left no Stone unrolled with terrific renditions of "Let It Bleed" and a set-closing "Sympathy for the Devil."
Probably while out procuring a draft beer (available only outside the infield at the Grandstand and in front of the Jazz and Blues tents for some reason), I found a few minutes to hear some of the aforementioned C.J. Chenier's set in the Blues Tent.
However, as is par for the course in the Blues Tent, the sound was lousy, so I moved on. I've seen C.J. a number of times, so it was OK to do so. And why this guy, of all people, is not playing at the outdoor Fais Do Do stage where huge paintings of his father and uncle cover the speaker towers, is beyond me.
Here's what C.J. looked like in the Blues Tent. Here are the Munck Music excerpts of all the songs, and here's a half hour of C.J. from Connecticut in 2016, just because he is so cool.
The highlight of my day was next at the Jazz and Heritage stage
Big Chief Bo Dollis Jr. and the Wild Magnolias
Jeff and Laurie at the Jazz and Heritage stage
Seen before: An annual appointment! Day 11 in 2014, Day 11 in 2015, Day 10 in 2017, and Day 11 last year.
If you time it just right on the big weekend days, you can get to the front of the Jazz and Heritage stage because it takes awhile for the crowd to form. Today I got there at just the right time and was right up front.
It took me a few years to understand what the Mardi Gras Indians were all about, and it was in those years that I could have seen the great Big Chief Bo Dollis at Jazz Fest. The first time I got to experience the Wild Magnolias was the first year that Bo Dollis Jr. did the show alone, as his father could not make it to the Fair Grounds. The next year that great man who, along with Big Chief Monk Boudreaux, brought the Mardi Gras Indians into the mainstream of New Orleans music, was gone. I'm not even going to pretend that I don't regret missing his unbelievable voice doing the Mardi Gras Indian chants.
Bo Dollis Jr. and his mother, Queen Rita, carry on admirably, though, and the Wild Magnolias are aptly named, as their performances at Jazz Fest are always wild, wild affairs. Dollis has a voice uncannily like his father's, the members of the Wild Magnolias have incredible suits and have a great time doing the chants, and the funk band backing them is always fantastic. From my spot at the front of the stage I got to enjoy the first part of this show with some of the family's friends, and that was very cool. When Laurie arrived mid-way through the show I joined her in the back because it was getting a bit crowded and, um, fragrant (and I do not mean body odor) down front.
Audio/Video: Here's my video of this great time at the Jazz and Heritage stage, and here is someone else's video of "Lil' Liza Jane." For some more, here are two from this year's Congo Square Rhythms Festival in Armstrong Park: the opener, "Injuns Here They Come" and "Papa Was a Rolling Stone."
Next was another band at the Jazz and Heritage stage, but first we grabbed our last food of the fest while the stage was changed.
Food! Yucca fries with Chimichurri
Laurie
Had Before: First time!
The crisp, golden sticks of the starchy yucca are fairly bland on their own, but work well as a delivery system for the chimichurri, giving a balanced platform and a bit of crunch. Chimichurri is a tangy, tart swirl of parsley, garlic, olive oil, garlic, herbs, and more garlic, the Latin version of pesto. The chimichurri served by second-year vendor Congreso Cubano is thick and garlicky and wonderful.
In a rare double billing of Jazz Fest food vendor and Jazz Fest musician, on Day 2, Orlando Vega dashed from his Congreso Cubano food booth to the Jazz and Heritage stage to play guitar with the Afrobeat orchestra Kumasi and then run back to continue serving ropa vieja and yucca fries. That takes some hustle, but that's fine with Vega. He knows the chance to ply his twin passions of food and music at Jazz Fest, of all places, is huge.
And if he had to count on help from friends and some improvisation to make it happen, well, that's what got him and his bootstrap food business to this point anyway. "It's this beautiful intersection of my goals," said Vega, a Miami native who runs Congreso Cubano with his friends Charlie Miller and Rick Ostry. "Jazz Fest is what first drew me to New Orleans. Being here now, it feels like acceptance in my new home."
Congreso Cubano is a new food vendor at Jazz Fest, and new vendors there don't come along too often. This one came up from the ranks of New Orleans pop-up eateries. Now it has a booth between the cochon de lait po-boy and the crawfish sacks. That's a little like street buskers one day seeing their names in the festival's music cubes.
"It was amazing to be in the planning meetings. You see the people who have been doing this forever, and they're giving you pats on the back," said Ostry. "Every one of them has told us, if we need anything they want to help."
Congreso Cubano starts with Vega's own Cuban family roots, but its food is not a straight tribute to the traditional. To Vega, Cuban history is too complicated for that. Instead, the food draws on influences from the Cuban diaspora and from the tension between authenticity and interpretation. "I am the son of immigrants," he said. "I'm not here to speak for my grandparents' generation. People in Cuba would not always recognize what we cook as Cuban today."
In its early days, Congreso Cubano was essentially based in the back of a Honda. Early pop-up gigs relied on friends spreading the word and showing up to lend support. But it soon gained a bigger following, built a track record and started picking up more catering jobs, like weddings and small conferences. It developed a circuit of regular appearances at bars, like Barrel Proof, and at the Music Box Village performance venue in Bywater.
"We never would have made it without our friends," said Miller. "At least two people working our booth this year, we catered their weddings."
Congreso Cubano got a trial run at Jazz Fest in 2017 when it was invited to serve food as part of a special showcase on Cuba at the Cultural Exchange Pavilion. This year, when the longtime vendor behind the Guil's gator dish dropped out, Congreso Cubano got the nod to join the food program full time.
The three partners hope the exposure gets them closer to their goal of opening a brick-and-mortar restaurant. They want a permanent location not just to have their own space but also to develop the idea of a Cuban experience in New Orleans. They envision a place where people can convene around music, drinks, food, and that sense of hospitality they feel connects that island nation and this island of a city.
"Everyone thinks about Miami and Cuba, but New Orleans' history with Cuba has a 100-year headstart," Vega said. "We're not introducing anything here that shouldn't have been celebrated in New Orleans a long time ago."
The band Vegas plays in, Kumasi, is New Orleans' own full Afrobeat orchestra. Its members fell in love with a style of music created by Fela Kuti and Tony Allen nearly 50 years ago, and now play some great Fela tunes and some Afro-funk from 1970s Ghana, but the majority of their scintillating live show is original music, stemming from West African concepts, composed to make any crowd move and groove. Check them out here and here.
Food! Fried shrimp po'boy
Jeff
Had Before: First time!
Vucinovich's Restaurant of New Orleans has been at Jazz Fest for 35 years, serving fried shrimp, fried oyster, and panéed chicken po'boys along with a spinach and fried oyster salad (Laurie's had this a couple of times), and a stuffed artichoke. The restaurant is located in New Orleans East. There, Herman Vucinovich and his family serve the basics, and only for lunch, and only on weekdays, but if you are there when they are open you will be rewarded with great food. The fried seafood is golden and crisp, and the portion is massive. Seriously, the shrimp kept falling out of the sandwich.
Stooges Brass Band
Jeff and Laurie at the Jazz and Heritage stage
Seen before: Day 2 in 2012, Day 11 in 2015, Day 11 in 2017, and Day 9 last year. Also at the Wolf Trap Swamp Romp in 2014, where I had a brief encounter with them on the grounds after they performed.
The Stooges present a raucous brass-band show, which is getting more hip-hoppy every time we see them. That's not a negative. They were having a great time, as was the big crowd ending their Jazz Fest at the Jazz and Heritage stage, as we have done ourselves.
Audio/Video: Here's some of our look at the Stooges at Jazz Fest today, and here's a full show from the Brooklyn Bowl in New York in 2017. Seriously good.
The Stooges would have been a fine option for ending our Jazz Fest. However, today we decided to dance our Jazz Fest away at the Fais Do Do stage.
The Mavericks
Jeff and Laurie at the Fais Do Do stage
Seen before: Day 4 in 2017
It goes without saying that dancing is in order when the Mavericks take you through the likes of "There Goes My Heart," "Back in Your Arms Again," and "All Night Long." Their mix of Tex-Mex, Cuban bolero, R&B, blues, country, and rock is beyond astonishing.
Plus it's a great show. The distinct individuals who make up the band gel so well musically and have great stage chemistry. Front man Raul Malo's powerful voice drives every song. Immaculately dressed guitarist Eddie Perez has both skill and sting in abundance. Jerry Dale McFadden in his bright yellow suit passionately grapples with both piano and keys while also dancing around. Paul Deakin on drums sets the prominent Tex-Mex rhythm the Mavericks have become renowned for. Add to that the equivalent of a mariachi band with Michael Guerra on accordions, Ed Friedland on stand-up bass and bass guitar, Maxwell Abrams on sax, and Julio Diaz on trumpet, and you have a simply incredible sound.
The Mavericks have been around for 30 years. Why they aren't more well known is a mystery to me.
Malo wrapped his sumptuous tenor around gorgeous tunes like "I Should Have Been True" and the Freddy Fender hit "Before the Next Teardrop Falls." The party really picked up with "As Long as There's Loving Tonight" and "Dance in the Moonlight." Accordion, piano, guitar, and brass solos extended virtually every tune over a churning groove that had the crowd ecstatic. The manic "I Said I Love You" was a Tex-Mex whirlwind of the sort that has sealed this band's reputation for being a tremendous live act.
They ended with, and our Jazz Fest ended with, the one-two punch of the bravado-dripping "Come Unto Me" and the most upbeat slice of feeling downtrodden there could be, "All You Ever Do Is Bring Me Down." I guess that's the inevitable emotion as we share our Fest-ending hug as the final show ends.
Audio/Video: Here's our back-of-crowd view of the Mavericks today, and here are "All Over Again" and "Easy as It Seems" from much closer in. And here is a full two hours from Jazz San Javier last year (this is fantastic). Watch it and you will believe.
As we left the infield to get to the back of the Gentilly stage where we found Rachel, we realized we were going to get some bonus Jazz Fest. Fogerty was still going strong, well past the 7 p.m. ending time. Some artists can get away with that, I guess. Turns out Trombone Shorty and the Neville family were doing the same thing at the Acura stage.
So the three of us hung around on the track back there, hardly able to see even the video boards, but it didn't matter, as Fogerty churned out a number of his massive hits to end his show. It was like an oldies radio station, with "Green River," "Fortunate Son," "Bad Moon Rising," and of course "Proud Mary." Because we weren't ready to go when the Mavericks ended, John Fogerty put an exclamation point on Jazz Fest 2019. We enjoyed every minute of our bonus time!
Here's my video, which is really just audio because I was noodling around the sky and the Fair Grounds. You won't see much of the stage.
A fairly long line finally got us onto a bus, but even so we were back downtown before dark. We were all tired, so we didn't do anything special for dinner, opting for a laid-back meal at the Gordon Biersch Brewery/ Restaurant that is part of the Harrah's complex just a couple of blocks down Poydras Street toward the river.
The vibe at this place is pretty good, and for a chain the food (and beer) are good, too. I had the Highlighter IPA and a chicken club sandwich with Swiss cheese and fresh avocado mayo. Laurie had the Blood Orange IPA and a Caprese flatbread, on which they allowed her to substitute real tomato for the grape tomatoes that she abhors.
Tomorrow we have a bonus day because of the ridiculous airfare structure of United Airlines. We'll be saying goodbye to Rachel and have a blockbuster evening meal planned. As for Jazz Fest, the eight days this year just couldn't have been better. Here's to 50 more years!
