Mr. B's Domain – The Log - Archive

April 23, 2005

Jazzfest 2005

I woke up in much better spirits this morning. Dad and I went to the second day of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. This was my third of forth year attending. The weather was cool and sunny exceptionally pleasant. It’s usually stiflingly hot. Dad parked in his usual stop not too far from the track. We got in just after one o’clock. We bumped into Aunt Lauren and Arien just after getting in. We made our way to the economy tent. The New Leviathan Oriental Foxtrot Orchestra played at 1:45. The band’s clarinet player used to be my boss, or one of them, at the uptown bookstore. I had been telling I would catch a performance. The New Leviathan is an 18-piece revivial orchestra that plays a pretty wide range of music dating back as far as 1895, including proto-Jazz and ragtime. While I didn’t overwhelmingly enjoy their performance, their talent and purpose is unmistakable. There are very few groups around preserving such musical forms. I went to get something to eat for Dad and I during the performance. Just afterward we went to see Ellis Marsalis. The sizable Jazz tent was quite full. We had to stand on the left end. Ellis’s son Branford was there as well as some other great supporting musicians. The show was excellent, no surprise there. After the Ellis Marsalis performance, we made our way through some thickening crowds to the Sprint/Sanyo stage where the Meters were to perform at 5:30. We took some seats on the track itself and then moved up shortly before 5:30. It was insanely crowded around the stage, so much so that it was difficult to enjoy the music, which wasn’t exactly stellar anyway. We remained in our spots until they finished at about ten past seven. After a trip to the potty, we left the fairgrounds and walked to Liuzza’s. We were there for a good while along with a hell of a lot of other people. We made our way home sometime after nine. I was pretty tired and I went to bed at a decent hour.

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