New Orleans Official Visitors Guide 2008/2009 - (Page 13) N mUsiC ew Orleans grooves along to its own distinct soundtrack. You taste it in the spicy highs and rich mellow tones of our food. You see it in the floating melodies forged into the lacy ironwork balconies of the French Quarter. And you feel it in the syncopated rhythms of passing streetcars and mule-drawn carriages. But nowhere do you experience the power of New Orleans music more clearly— more beautifully—than in the music itself. The Birthplace of Jazz Strange that jazz, considered America’s only original art form, would be born in a city so unlike the rest of America. Yet it couldn’t have come from anywhere else. It’s a musical form first shaped by Storyville parlor pianists, Italian brass players, Creole musicians schooled in Europe and the African drummers of Congo Square. And jazz’s earliest stars—Buddy Bolden, Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, King Oliver, Sidney Bechet, Danny Barker— all erupted from this mix. The tradition lives on in expressions like the brass band, which you can still see marching the streets in jazz funerals and Carnival parades. In fact, New Orleans has never stopped producing musical talent. While some local performers—like Wynton Marsalis, Branford Marsalis, the Neville Brothers and Harry Connick, Jr.—have made their careers out of town, others continue to meet the world on their home turf. Catch Kermit Ruffins, Irvin Mayfield and the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra, Nicholas Payton, Ellis Marsalis, Troy Andrews and many others performing at places like the Palm Court Jazz Cafe, Donna’s, Snug Harbor, Sweet Lorraine’s, Tipitina’s and Preservation Hall. Rhythm & Blues If New Orleans is revered for its jazz, it is loved for its rhythm & blues. Since the 1950s, New Orleans artists have been taking the blues and rock to new heights. The city gave birth to legends like guitarist Earl King, pianist Professor Longhair, drummer Earl Palmer, and the team of Dave Bartholomew and Fats Domino, who together defined the New Orleans continued on page 16 V i s i t O u r W e b s i t e at W W W. n e W O r l e a n s i n f O. c O m http://WWW.neWOrleansinfO.cOm
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