The Big Man Has Joined The Biggest House Band of All

Clarence Anicholas Clemons, Jr. (January 11, 1942 – June 18, 2011)

”Pull down the blinds, bring fiddle and clarionet That there be no foot silent in the room Nor mouth from kissing, nor from wine unwet; Our Father Rosicross is in his tomb.”

William Butler Yeats

JazzFest Weekend 2

Wonderful weather, more great music than you possibly hear in a weekend and food, food, food.  Ya aint been to heaven till ya been down her. 

Getting ready to head back in for the last day but here’s a few quick pics and some more on Flickr over to the right.

Peace love and crawfish

Why We Call It the Big Easy

So JazzFest kicked off this week and we had several first time visitors stop by.  And one of the questions we get from first timers is “why DO you call it the Big Easy?.”

Well here’s how it goes.  We had two crawfish boils going in the neighborhood, one arond the corner at Mid City Stevies and one across the street at MathMan Matts.

 

My buddy Dave Glynn from Chicago was here staying with me and his friend Richie with his wife Nora came down as well. Dave and Richie have a blues band in Chicago, which is like having a restaurant in New Orleans. You better be good to survive. 

Well The Empty Can Band is pretty good and so we imposed on them to play a few tunes. And one of Stevies tenants, Erin, can carry a tune OK so she joined in.

Then we went over to listen to a little music.  Couple of folks you may have heard of.  Irma Thomas joined by Marcia Ball.   Bon Jovi. Dr. John doing a tribute to his old friend and drummer Herman Edwards.  Jeff Beck joined by Trombone Shorty. Tom Jones killing St. James Infirmary. John Mellencamp killing an entire set.  Fantasia deciding she didn’t like two rows of barricades between her and the fans and getting off the stage and wading into the crowd.

I didn’t get to see Mumford & Sons or Arlo or Tab Benoit or … well you get the picture.

And we ate some great food. Introduced Davey to Crawfish Monica. He asked if that was what she did now. I said no, different Monica. .

Then back for some more mudbugs and music on the porch. Another old friend Christy Burke handling the vocals this time. Then some young Columbian musicians came strolling by and sat in.

And to borrow from the great writer Walter Mosley, “I sat with my friends, on my porch, at my house, and we laughed a long time …”.  Sometime during all that I turned to Nora and said  “THIS is why we call it The Big Easy.”

And it is.

Little follow up.  The great HBO series Treme is filming today at the JazzFest site and Gayle went over to be an extra for the crowd scenes. Her report was that the best perk was not the hobnobbing with movie stars and musicians and a day of free music in the Blues Tent and Acura Stage but free crawfish monica when they filmed a scene at the food booths!! 

Music, food and friends. THAT’S why we call it The Big Easy!!

True dat.

STELLLAAAAAAA

Elena Passarello of Grand Rapids, Mich is the winner of this years Stella Yella contest and man could she bring it, with a piercing voice that rattled the windows all over Jackson Square.

See the full story at http://www.nola.com/arts/index.ssf/2011/03/annual_stella_calling_contest.html

Is There Life After Mardi Gras?

Well this past weekend  felt like Mardi Gras II in New Orleans.  The high hotel occupancy that started during carnival continued and huge crowds showed up for both the Metairie Irish-Italian Parade and the Italian-American Marching Club St. Joseph’s Day parade .

Then throughout the weekend the various Mardi Gras Indian gangs were forming in their neighborhoods culminating in the Super Sunday parade which features the meeting of all the tribes in a community parade.

So are we ready for some time off?  Please.

This weekend we host the Sweet 16 South East Regional playoffs for the NCAA basketball tourney.  The NFL owners are in town for their annual Scrooge McDuck Money Count meeting as is  the  Council on Litigation Management  … lawyers and claims reps and adjusters, oh my!   

And starting today, the French Quarter is host to the annual Tennessee Williams Festival. 

The latter features some great panel discussions including two bestselling Irish crime novelists John Connolly and Declan Hughes discuss their “Ten Mysteries You Must Read Before You Die.” in which they name local icon James Lee Burke the top living mystery writer.  And it also includes one of my favorite events of the entire year,  the Stella Yella contest during which contestants in Jackson Square re-enact the famous scene from Streetcar Named Desire with Marlon Brando as Stanley standing under Stella’s balcony screaming her name.  It’s a must see!!

And this is the last week of the race season at the Fairgrounds Race Track, featuring the 98th running of the Louisiana Derby, which can mean just one thing.

ONLY 34 DAYS TO JAZZ FEST!!!!!!!!

Throwin of the Green (cabbages that is)

OK I know Mardi Gras was Tuesday but St. Paddys Day is a fixed calendar event so when it comes around it comes around. And a holiday means just one thing in New Orleans … parades. 

 Well really it means more than one thing but the topic for today is parades. As in Mollys Carriage Parade Friday in the Quarter, the Irish Channel Parade on Saturday Uptown and the Metarie Irish Parade Sunday in Old Metarie. And of course the Downtown Irish Club Parade on Thursday. 

Then Super Sunday for the Mardi Gras Indians a week from today ….  ooops, that’s another story also.

Now usually I ride in the Mollys Carriage Parade but really this year I was just too tired. At my age you have to pace yourself.  Especially when you’re doing Mardi Gras with Gayle who apparently has the DNA from which the Energizer Bunny was spawned.

 So I opted for the sunshine and fresh air of the Irish Channel on Saturday.  Good choice as we had great crowds with up close and personal floats and marching groups, including the Emerald Society with representatives of police departments from New York, Chicago, Baltimore and Boston as well as a band of pipers from the New York Fire Department. 

 

 

 



 



As always, the signature throw for St. Paddys Day is a cabbage. Yes the vegetable. And believe me, you better be paying attention when they start heaving those bad boys around because they don’t bounce off the noggin like plastic beads.

 

So Happy St. Patricks Day to one and all …. I’ll have more from the parade on Thursday!  Until then, peace love and cabbages.

All On A Mardi Gras Day

So people always ask me, “Tom, if you don’t drink then WHAT do you do on Mardi Gras?”   Well the short answer is, “put on a costume and walk around”. 

You see for the locals, Mardi Gras is a time of great celebration with family and friends.  And costumes are an enormous part of that celebration. Inevitably early on Mardi Gras morning, either Gayle or I will be walking down the street in the French Quarter to get coffee and we’ll pass a few police officers on a corner. They’ll look at us and one will say “NOW it’s beginning to look like Mardi Gras”.

Bourbon Street. Beads. Boobs. Drunken college kids. That’s 10 blocks in a city of half a million people.  Royal St, Chartres St, Decatur and Frenchman. That’s where our party is and a huge part is just walking up and down the street, having your picture taken, talking to folks you know, stopping to sit with friends, listen to music and watch other costumers. 

Oh yeah,  and eat.   Red beans and rice, gumbo, shrimp etouffe, fried gator, po boys, beignets, Mardi Gras Pasta at Pere Antoinnes on the corner of Royal and St. Anne   ….  then comes lunch.

It is the worlds largest …and friendliest …block party and everyone is having a great time doing nothing much but have a great day.

And one thing we used to do with our son when he was younger was sit on the McRaneys stoop on Royal St and keep track of license plates from other states.  I still do it and send the map to Seamus every year to let him know I’m thinking of him. Here is this years map. The numbers on the right are the daily legend, beginning on the Thursday before Fat Tuesday. This year we saw plates from 41 states and Wash DC as well as 4 Candian provinces and 3 Mexican states.  The record is 44 states in 2005, which was the year of Seamus’ 16th birthday (he got to ride Tucks) and Hurricane Katrina. 

So a few strolling pictures are below and more are on Flickr to the right. 

As we like to say, “everywhere else in the world, it’s just Tuesday”.

Mardi Gras Is Over

It’s Ash Wednesday and New Orleans is in a pensive mood of contemplation and reflection suitable for the season of Lent.  Fat Tuesday was warm with scattered showers and the massive thunder storms that threatened yesterday held off until this morning helping give the city an even greater sense of being washed clean of the sins of Carnival excesss.

The celebration of Mardi Gras officially ended with the traditional march of police up Bourbon St and the saluting of the crowd (mostly locals) at the corner of Bourbon and St Ann streets.  Not coincidentally, two corners on that interesection are the occupied by gay nightclubs and the crowds are enthusiastic in cheering the police for their work over the past two weeks.

The other great tradition after Mardi Gras continued long into the night as revelers were heading home.

This was a good carnival season as Mardi Gras was late this year, actually the next to latest day it can occur.  During the season we’ve had parades galore,

Mardi Gras Indians,

parties and food 

beads and babes and bikes

celebrations with friends both old and new.

Sure some people try to spoil the fun but sometimes their boss shows up to keep them in line.

So another Mardi Gras is in the books. We’d think about next year but first we have St. Patricks Day parades this weekend, then French Quarter Fest, then Jazz Fest, then …  well you get the idea.

I’ll be posting some more pics on my Flicker account and here’s some links to pics by Ernie Svenson and the Times Picayune.

Until next time, peace love and crawfish.

Put On Your Dancing Shoes

The Krewe of Muses rolled last night and lived up to their reputation as one of the best throwing parades of Mardi Gras. 

In Greek mythology, the Muses are the Greek goddesses (Calliope, Clio, Erato, Euterpe, Melpomene, Polyhymnia, Terpsichore, Thalia, and Urania) who were the daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory and were patrons of the arts and sciences. In New Orleans they are street names and one of the best parades of the season. The Krewe of Muses has 1100 members, of which roughly 700 ride in 23 floats. The parade theme is a secret until just before they roll and this year it was Dancing With Muses, in keeping with their best known symbol and most coveted throw, the Muses Shoe.

The parade has become one of Mardi Gras’ favorites, with satirical float themes ,  great marching bands, a multitude of great throws and humorous sub groups including the Big Easy Rollergirls,  the Pussyfooters, the Rolling Elvi and the 610 Stompers.

Here’s a view live shots of the fun …

 

 

Trow Me Sometin Mistah

It’s carnival time in NOLA and parading began in earnest this weekend.  

Friday was Oshun, then Ponchartrian on Saturday afternoon followed by the Saturday evening back to back treat of Sparta and Pygmalion. 

 

This afternoon we’ll see Carollton and King Arthur as well as the immensely popular Krewe of Barkus in the Quarter.

This weeks events will start on Wednesday evening with Druids and you can see a full list here so come on out.  It’s carnival in New Orleans: the magnolia blossoms fill the air and you ain’t been ta heaven till ya been down here.