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A musical antidote to Katrina
Festival returns on a high note--of hope
By Howard Reich
Tribune arts critic
Published April 28, 2006 NEW ORLEANS -- Eight months ago, the grounds were flooded, the musicians scattered, the city nearly empty.
Everything required to stage Louisiana's biggest performance and culture bash, in other words, was in tatters in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
But Friday, when the 37th annual New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival kicks off at the Fair Grounds Race Course--its longtime home--an event that once seemed vanquished by Katrina will defiantly re-emerge.
The question is whether anyone will come.
"I sure hope so, because right now this city is in trouble, this city is hurting, and we need some good news," said noted New Orleans drummer Shannon Powell, who will play the festival twice before it closes May 7.
"Music is a good thing after any kind of tragedy," Powell added. "It's a spiritual thing, and we need this festival to bring people back here."
Whether this year's against-the-odds comeback can attract anything close to the 400,000-plus who attended last year's event or the 600,000-plus of record years is uncertain, considering that the six-day fest, spread over two weekends, is one day shorter than usual. With much of the city's population still gone and tourism nowhere near the levels of the past, the first Jazz Fest since Katrina faces ample hurdles.
Yet with headliners such as Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen and Fats Domino, the marquee power of the event--a jazz festival in name only given the variety of genres on stage--may be stronger than ever.
"Look--we've got Fats Domino on the festival poster" and playing the first weekend, said associate producer Louis Edwards. "The last time a lot of people saw Fats, he was on TV being rescued from the hurricane."
Added festival spokesman Matthew Goldman, "We're optimistic, but it's an outdoor event that depends on the kindness of the weather and a lot of other factors this year, so you never know."
Yet the very fact that this festival is being staged at all seems a minor miracle of strategic planning. With most of the city's musicians and festival organizers dispersed across the country after Katrina, few believed the event would be resurrected at all, let alone on a scale that's close to previous installments. With a cast of more than 400 bands (roughly 90 percent of last year's lineup), the event shows only minor diminishment from the past, at least on paper.
The slick color brochure still lists hundreds of attractions. The banners featuring the image of New Orleanians parading --or second-lining--through the boulevards still decorate lampposts and street signs.
Arriving at this point, however, has not been easy.
`A big obstacle'
"Just getting over the psychological hump of what happened to us, and to our city, was a big obstacle," said producer Edwards. "Then we had to find musicians scattered across the country, we had to determine whether the infrastructure would be there to put on the festival, whether there would be hotel rooms for all the musicians and others."
The festival's planners gave themselves a deadline of Jan. 15 to determine whether the event could go forward, and as they approached that date, Shell Oil Co. signed on as the event's first "presenting sponsor," meaning its financial support and promotional opportunities would top that of all other sponsors. With companies such as AIG, American Express, BellSouth, Southern Comfort and others joining the sponsorship list, the planned event was gaining economic muscle.
To New Orleanians, the significance of the festival transcends dollars and cents, even though the budget is approaching last year's $10 million.
"It means a great deal--it's another way of showing the city is coming back," said John Hyman, who lives in the French Quarter and has been attending the festival since he moved to New Orleans in 1976.
"There's a lot of anticipation . . . even though I expect attendance will be down."
Said Jason Patterson, program director of the non-profit New Orleans Jazz Centennial Celebration, "This year's festival is so important to the city, and its future, that it just has to come off well. |