Issue Articles
Whose House? Shagg’s House!: Expect the Unexpected with Ryan “Shaggadelic” Batiste
Ryan “Shaggadelic” Batiste has been in the lab, and the fruits of his labor are coming to light. He has a new album, Shagg’s House, as a featured artist with his group Raw Revolution at Gentilly Fest, and his own Locals’ Fest just turned five this year.
Living Up To Its Moniker: The TBC Brass Band
The TBC Brass Band, which closes out this year’s Treme Fall Festival on Saturday, October 26, 2024, has truly lived up to its name. Formed in 2002 by students at Carver and Kennedy high schools, it carried on and remained a unit through devastatingly tough hardships such as hurricane Katrina and the murder of a saxophonist Brandon Franklin.
Jonathon “Boogie” Long: Missing mentor Luther Kent, but moving forward
Jonathon “Boogie” Long has been making music for 30 of his 36 years on Earth. From a family of singers, he first played guitar at six years old. Growing up in the Baton Rouge area with sacred music, rhythm-and-blues, blues, jazz fusion and jam band music, he evolved into the eclectic performer and songwriter heard on his four, soon to be five albums.
Boo! Ghosts Are Watching: Stoo Odom on His Spooky New Album
In 2013, after nearly two decades in San Francisco, the nimble-fingered bass man and composer Stoo Odom moved back to his birthplace, where he was conceived in what is now the New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum and his father co-founded the legendary Maple Leaf Bar.
50 Years and Tomorrow: Festivals Acadiens et Créoles Celebrates 50
If you haven’t heard by now, brace yourself for a shock: Festivals Acadiens et Créoles (FAeC) celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Halfway to the centurion mark is astoundingly remarkable for anything, corporations, marriages, let alone a grassroots, non-commercial festival.
Bobby Rush Talks Back
Bobby Rush, the blues man who put funk in the blues, turns 91 years old on November 10. A singer, harmonica player, guitarist and songwriter, his late-blooming mainstream success includes the three Grammy awards he’s won in the past decade. Rush’s 28th album, All My Love for You, clinched the latest of those golden gramophone statuettes in February.
An Attitude For Altitude: The Return of the Headhunters
For over 50 years, The Headhunters have been breaking ground, first with Herbie Hancock, as the baddest most innovative band out there. They’re continuing to do so on new release The Stunt Man from Ropeadope. With albums including Head Hunters, Thrust, Flood, and Man-Child, they not only pioneered jazz-funk on a wholly other sonic level but also had a visual component now referred to as Afrofuturism. All this is in keeping with the ethos that you can’t go to the future without the roots of the past.
Dining Out: Smoke & Honey
Vassiliki Ellwood Yiagazis has merged two of her family cultures to create her restaurant in Mid City. Smoke & Honey offers a menu uniquely inspired by Ellwood Yiagazis’ Greek and Jewish heritage. Ellwood Yiagazis and her business partners Lauren Lynch and Chad Vigneulle opened the spot in January.
It’s Time to Celebrate Black Americana Fest
t’s long overdue for the first New Orleans festival focused on elevating “the narrative, music, and history of Black artists in the Folk, Country, and Americana traditions.” Dusky Waters, Teena May, and Mark Williams II have planned a great day focused on music, inclusion, and community.
Young Men Olympian Jr. Celebrates Its Amazing 140th Anniversary
It’s difficult to conceive that the Young Men Olympian Jr. Benevolent Association has been active since 1884, just over to 20 years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation freeing enslaved people in the United States. One can imagine, however, how important the organization was at the time when one of its prime functions was to provide burial services to Blacks who during that era were denied life insurance by white owned companies.
