In the beginning, it always seems so leisurely: the magnolias and jasmine bloom, the crawfish come in season, and the organizers behind New Orleans' Jazz & Heritage Fest promise to once again put on one of the most incredible music festivals in the world. And then suddenly it's six in the morning five days later at the Maple Leaf Bar way uptown where Galactic's Stan Moore is delving into some electronica-jazz with the trio known as "Garage A Trois," or the wildly popular Jewish funk rock ensemble New Orleans Klezmer Allstars are appearing in a new art space on a Friday night for the most intimate Klezmer gig in NOLA history. Happy JazzFest.
Every year, New Orleans takes seven days out of its life to open its doors to the world and show off its soul. Visitors come for the food, or for the party, or for particular kinds of music they know and love. But often what happens is something they never really expected. Some of them wait to see the Sting or the Big Bad Voodoo Daddy shows because these are the people they have heard of, but stumble upon some insanely alive musical moment instead. You can always see it when it happens: somewhere in the audience, a young man will throw his hands in the air, drop his jaw and lose himself in music he has never heard before. Or a girl will double over, laughing in hysterics at how incredibly good it sounds when Jim Singleton of Astral Project goes off on an upright bass solo in the tail end of a set that even had the stage production guys dancing in the aisles.
The Festival is a good proving ground for the notion that the heritage of jazz is indeed alive in popular music. On Friday, Lyle Lovett's large band mixed country two-stepping with jazz and swing, while the night before, Future Man of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones got the crowd dancing with his famous drum-machine guitar and Victor Wooten showed off the ridiculous riffs he can master with a few moments of silence. On Saturday, old school funk was represented by Chocolate Milk, who took audiences back to their first slow dances with smooth, Southern-style soul. It didn't take long before it became clear to even cynics of mainstream music that the Jazz & Heritage Fest knew what it was doing when it combined national and local acts in such a way that, for twenty dollars a day, guests had to check out a little of everything.
Still, a number of locals vocalized some barely veiled skepticism about the legitimacy of having pop stars at a celebration of musical heritage. Robert Wagner, a horn player with the Klezmers and the Iris May Tango, pointed out that as the bigger-name acts take central spots at the bigger stages, local music is forced further towards the periphery of the New Orleans Fairgrounds racetrack every year. Even at night, when bands who have not been invited to play the JazzFest have the chance to show a bigger-than-usual audience what they're all about at non-JazzFest-sponsored events, clubs had trouble finding room for local shows that were not being promoted by Superfly, the House of Blues or Tipitina's.
The competition between local favorites and national acts may have been fierce, but every night for seven days, there were more musical options than any fan could hope to imagine. Unfortunately, seeing even a fraction of it all required some serious crowd-stamina. Shows at the Maple Leaf and the Masonic Temple were so insanely hot and packed that even fanatics and friends of the musicians found it hard to appreciate the normal New Orleans vibe of their favorite bands.
There were more sold-out shows this year across the city than there have been in the past five years. Superfly Productions, the boys that organized the much-hyped Thursday's Oysterhead show, also showcased some other incredible superjams, including pairings of Galactic and Medeski Martin and Wood on a riverboat cruise the night after the fest ended, three presentations of the Charlie Hunter/Skerik/Stanton Moore electronica-jazz trio, as well as Luna, Wilco, Karl Denzen's Tiny Universe and New Orleans standbys, Henry Butler and Rebirth Brass Band.
Overall, JazzFest is in itself a superjam of sorts. While the crowds can be stifling and the big names sometimes detract attention away from less mainstream or simply less well-known acts, the concentration of musical phenomena in such a small town is a natural recipe for a full-fledged celebration of sound. Indeed, the whole week might well be summed up with the very words used to introduce King Sunny Ade and His African Beats closing Sunday set: "Welcome to the happiest, most alive music on the planet."
JENNIFER ODELL
(May 9, 2000)
