Posts Tagged ‘Jazz Fest’

I fell in love with Kurt Elling’s Chicago Jazz around the time of his 2nd CD. He’s got an amazing talent, and I’d sort of fallen out of touch with his stuff over the last few years. He’s always been sort of out there, scatting and free styling quite a bit, and now it’s like musical Tourette’s – he just can’t seem to help himself.

Here’s a little snippet of him opening his show and shows his sort of 40s era persona, which is great, except that his skin was about the same shade as his suit, and under the bright lights, he looks…uh…radiant. Yeah. Radiant.

During the Trucks show the Blues Tent was mobbed- and the band was really high energy. People couldn’t keep themselves from jumping up and dancing.

But the tent floor is flat, not sloped, and one lone security guy was trying to keep everybody sitting down so people behind could see.

It was like a big whack-a-mole game. He’d get one down and three more would pop up. Not very effective but pretty amusing.

Inside the Blues Tent

One of the first acts we caught on Sunday was Batiste and we just couldn’t get away from him all day.

He started out in the Jazz Tent with his mouth organ, before switching to piano.

Then he was off at the Borders tent signing CDs and answering questions.

And he wrapped up the day in the Blues Tent with the Derek Trucks Band.

I found Batiste fun, and Charlie liked him but thought he was a little gimmicky. We both thought Derek Trucks was a blast.

It was one of those great Jazz Fest accidents- we only ended up seeing him because…well, because I am a weenie. It was hot, I was beat, every damn booth was out of water and since the last day of Fest was coincidentally the only dry day the Fairgrounds was mobbed.

I was actually ready to call a cab and pack it in when we decided to see if it was possible to get inside one of the tents with their blessed misters.

Lots of people had the same idea so it wasn’t easy, but we were pushy and were rewarded thusly:

In my wanderings on Sunday I just happened upon our own lovely Prince of Wales group marching and the ladies were front and center as always…

It won’t be too long before it’s time for their annual march in the ‘hood.

Saturday, April 27th 2008, Fais Do Do stage.

Saturday, 4/27/08, Accura Stage:

Incidentally, when my assistant Nancy saw my Jon Cleary post, she laughed and told me this story:

Decades ago her husband Franz was helping out friends at the Maple Leaf on Oak Street by working the door when this kid came up and asked him what the cover charge was. Franz looked at the backpack and suitcase in his hand and asked him where he’d come from.

When he found out that the kid had just gotten off the plane from England and come directly to the Maple Leaf to experience the New Orleans music scene first hand, Franz said “No charge- c’mon in.”

Small world, no?

Saturday at Jazz Fest was quite the event. The skies were threatening when we got there, but hey, 30% chance of rain’s not so bad, right?

Famous last words:

This was taken during Dr. John’s abbreviated set. He cut it well short and got the hell out of there while we, the remaining nuts in the significantly thinned crowd stayed put.

All of that rain built up to become this about 1 1/2 hours later:

That was taken during the Billy Joel portion of the afternoon…who, it should be mentioned, started early, but stayed on to play his full set.

So I suppose I don’t really have to mention that we’re sick as dogs today? (but still unrepentant. We’ll certainly never forget it, and that trumps a cold any day.)