Issue Articles
Karen Ocker
Karen Ocker’s award-winning assemblage of art pieces mine the deep well of iconic New Orleans music and musicians and have been widely exhibited and collected throughout the U.S. and Europe.
Kyle Roussel
A pianist, composer, producer, prolific sideman and sometimes singer, Roussel will perform selections from the album during his April 23 set at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. He’ll also be a most-valued supporting player throughout the festival’s two weekends, joining performances by the Allen Toussaint Legacy Band, Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Erica Falls, Meters drummer Zigaboo Modeliste and more.
Bonerama
It’s fine to blow your own horn sometimes, especially when you’re in a band full of trombone players. So, Bonerama leader Mark Mullins can be proud of the fact that his band just made a strong album in six weeks’ time, from first notes to mixdown—and one of those weeks even included the Christmas holidays. The album, So Much Love, breaks a seven-year recording silence, gets some of their recent live standouts on disc, and introduces the latest incarnation of the long-admired band.
Bill Summers
For an album with only four tracks on it, Herbie Hancock’s 1973 opus Head Hunters made a mighty impression. It expanded the bounds of fusion, resonating with funk/R&B fans the way Mahavishnu and Chick Corea had looped in the prog-rockers. It contributed at least two standards to the repertoire, “Chameleon” and the reworked version of “Watermelon Man.” And it birthed a band that’s on its third or fourth life right now.
Vicki Peterson & John Cowsill
One night in April 1979, a young Vicki Peterson took herself to a Cowsills show at a small club in Redondo Beach. There were absolutely no fireworks when she had a fannish encounter with her teenage crush—the drummer, John Cowsill.
Eric Adcock
Three-time Grammy nominee Eric Adcock played key roles in the making of the Grammy-winning album A Tribute to the King of Zydeco. Released in June 2025, the all-star project celebrated the centennial year of zydeco pioneer Clifton Chenier’s birth.
Don Vappie
Back in March, banjo and guitar veteran band leader Don Vappie appeared live on social media for his Coffee on the Porch with Don, a beloved private moment that started daily during COVID with his worldwide fans. It’s less frequent now, but when he can, he still chats about music, politics or the weather, or almost anything else.
Boyfriend
Suzannah Powell is formally breaking up with her Boyfriend. The performance alter-ego that she’s worked under for the past 15 years is being retired, and this year’s will be the final Boyfriend show at Jazz Fest (though not the last altogether, a farewell tour is coming later in the year). But this year she’s also staging her concept piece, In The Garden, which signals her future direction: A return to her first love, musical theater. So, this year marks a fresh start as well as an ending.
Jon Batiste
Jon Batiste has planned a big Jazz Fest weekend. For the festival’s first Friday, the Grammy-and Oscar-winning singer, pianist and composer headlines at the Festival Stage. He returns Sunday with Jon Batiste Presents Swamp in the Blues Tent. Between the Friday and Sunday Jazz Fest shows, Batiste goes to Atlanta for a Saturday night concert with the Atlanta Pops Orchestra.
Terence Blanchard
It’s undoubtedly safe to say that most people, even those deep into jazz, never realize that legends trumpeter Miles Davis and saxophonist John Coltrane were born in the same year 100 years ago, 1926.
