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From OffBeat Magazine: The second annual NOLA Funk Fest returns to the New Orleans Jazz Museum while also heralding support and awareness for the Louisiana Music and Heritage Experience — an upcoming large-scale museum project devoted to comprehensively telling the history of Louisiana’s music.
The 2024 NOLA Funk Fest includes multiple unique symposia, a comprehensive exhibition, and a special show—all focusing on Louisiana’s deep and varied contributions to the genre of blues. While blues music is most frequently associated with the Mississippi Delta or Chicago, hugely important developments for the genre occurred across the Bayou State—from Bobby Rush to Slim Harpo, among countless others.
Shake Your Hips: An exhibit telling the Louisiana blues story
One of the ways NOLA Funk Fest will tell the story of Louisiana’s blues music is through the exhibition Shake Your Hips, opening October 18 in conjunction with the festival at the New Orleans Jazz Museum. Co-curated by David Kunian, music curator for the New Orleans Jazz Museum and Bob Santelli, founding curator of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame.
According to Kunian, following he and Santelli’s inaugural 2023 Funk Fest exhibition on Fats Domino and Dave Bartholomew that is now moving to the African American Museum in Monroe, they wanted to curate an exhibit that incorporates history created through the entire state of Louisiana.
Shake Your Hips promises to weave a story from Baton Rouge swamp blues greats like Slim Harpo and Tabby Thomas; to Shreveport’s contributions of Huddie William “Lead Belly” Ledbetter and Bobby Rush; to New Orleans’ extensive blues legacy including Slim Harpo, Guitar Slim, Dave Bartholomew, and countless others. It will also include blues greats from places in between such as Buddy Guy from Central Louisiana, and Acadiana where blues melds into zydeco—a prime example being Clifton Chenier. “There’s an embarrassment of riches that we can pull from,” Kunian said.
Among the physical artifacts displayed to illustrate this dynamic and vibrant story will be Clifton Chenier’s crown from his 1981 King of Zydeco record, one of Sonny Landreth’s guitar slides, the sign from now-closed Tabby’s Blues Box in Baton Rouge loaned by Tabby Thomas’s son Chris Thomas King, and one of Walter “Wolfman” Washington’s red suits with matching guitar and shoes. “That I’m literally looking at right now,” Kunian marveled. “They’re so red and so sparkly that they almost glow, without any light on them.”
These are only the beginning of the wealth of tangible blues history that will be on display: Little Freddie King’s hat and sunglasses, harmonicas once played by Little Walter and Lazy Lester, Lead Belly’s handwritten letters and pocket watch, and a guitar belonging to Buddy Guy are also among the riches. “So, we’ve got stuff that could illustrate what we’re trying to say about the fact that the blues is very buried in Louisiana, but it’s here,” Kunian emphasized. “And in certain ways it’s as vital to the country as blues is anywhere.”
With a genre that has roots running so deep and broad through Louisiana, homing in on a cohesive narrative can be a challenge. “So, what you try to do is to pick the stories that are most interesting, number one, that basically tie together into a cohesive story about the blues in Louisiana,” Santelli explained of the curation process. Shake Your Hips is designed so that even those with little knowledge of or interest in the blues will walk out with a better understanding of the genre and—its curators hope—a sparked desire to learn more.
Santelli also clarified that the exhibit’s themes are relevant to those with interest in any of Louisiana’s genres, because the blues has been so influential on other musical forms throughout time. “People should come to see this exhibit simply because it tells an important part of Louisiana’s very rich music history,” Santelli urged, recalling blues’ foundational contributions to jazz, rock ’n’ roll, hip-hop, and R&B. “Many people these days feel like blues is a historical music form that had its great days in the past, but for the most part, its time is over. And what we try to explain here is that blues is the bedrock of American music. It’s also the bedrock of Louisiana music.”
Gris Gris, Bayous and Mojo: A Musical Journey Through The History of Louisiana Blues
The glorious thing about music history in Louisiana is that it is still being made all of the time, and blues is no exception. To emphasize the myriad ways Louisiana’s blues heritage continues going strong, New Orleans slide guitarist and WWOZ DJ Marc Stone has curated a special show as part of the exhibit opening party on October 18 titled “Gris Gris, Bayous, and Mojo: A Musical Journey Through the History of Louisiana Blues” for Super VIP ticket holders.
“It’s really important that all of this is presented as a living, breathing art form that’s moving forward, not something just from a frozen past to celebrate,” Stone said. “And I think a great thing for New Orleans, artistically and musically, and it’s happening on a lot of levels—to see artists who have a real love and respect for the roots, but with the self-determination and artistic confidence to be their own artists in their own time.”
Among the musicians to showcase their reverence for the genre’s history as well as their own contributions to it will be Chris Thomas King—whose 2021 book The Blues: The Authentic Narrative of My Music and Culture emphasizes Louisiana’s often under-recognized importance to blues origins.
Slide guitarist and singer John Mooney will also be featured alongside many of Louisiana’s other most notable blues players; all backed by Stone’s band, with Stone serving as musical director.
“I’ve been so fortunate and grateful to have all these people, many of whom were my heroes from recordings before I knew them. I’m very lucky to be able to have a lot of artists who have made their own very notable contributions to the genre and who represent a bunch of different flavors within the spectrum of Louisiana blues,” Stone effused. “So, to be able to get together a group of great artists—most of whom I have history with and really already have a nice musical flow with—to do this is really fun.”
In true New Orleans fashion, Stone is leaving room in the set to encourage the powerhouse artists performing in the show to lean into creative spontaneity. “I don’t want to take great artists like this and box them into an idea that’s defined enough to limit their own creativity and interpretation,” Stone said. “Giving great artists a platform in which they can have fun and be expressive is a very wonderful thing.”
The goal of the evening is to reflect a wide breadth of both cultural and musical influences on the genre in Louisiana. “If you look at Louisiana blues, what someone like Slim Harpo did is so completely different from something like what Walter “Wolfman” Washington did. Not just generationally,” Stone said. “Louisiana blues is a huge umbrella under which a lot of amazing sounds exist. So I try to give people a sense of the breadth and beauty of that spectrum within Louisiana blues.”
Symposia: “Louisiana Blues Harmonica Masters” & “Women of Louisiana Blues”
Featured as part of this year’s NOLA Funk Fest are two exclusive symposia covering Louisiana blues, both produced by Tipitina’s founder and OffBeat Lifetime Achievement in Music Business awardee Sonny Schneideau and moderated by Kunian.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the symposia will each have musical components, too. Helmed by a killer house band featuring George Porter Jr. on bass, Michael Lemmler on keys, John Fohl on guitar, and Herlin Riley on drums. “The band is absolutely gonna be phenomenal,” Schneideau said.
October 19 aims to navigate the harmonica’s substantial influence on blues in the Bayou State. Besides Grammy-winning historian Santelli, the panel includes American Routes host Nick Spitzer, musicians Bruce “Sunpie” Barnes, Johnny Sansone, and Bobby Rush.
“We’re super excited about the stories that they can tell as well as the songs they’re going to bring to life,” Schneideau said. “It’s music and conversation interspersed, and we feel that gives a good flow and tells a good story. We’re not interested in it being a class. We want it to be fun and engaging.”
October 20th brings “Women in Louisiana Blues Music,” which will emphasize the crucial role women have played in the formation of Louisiana blues. Among the panelists will be Irma Thomas, Marcia Ball, Scott Billington, Gwen Thompkins, Ben Sandmel.
“I really tried to think of people who have a lot to say on the subject and are able to help us put something together that’s both captivating and entertaining,” Schneideau said. “To hear it from people like Bobby Rush and Irma Thomas, whose contributions to the music are just tremendous. And to hear them be able to talk about their experiences, their influences—I think it’s just a really rare and special opportunity that we’re offering.”
In the name of the funky blues
Though “funk” is in the festival’s name, it only takes a short walk down Frenchmen Street to hear the ways funk and blues are inexplicably intertwined in New Orleans. And, given the Louisiana Music and Heritage Experience’s intended mission to showcase all of Louisiana’s genres, it only makes sense that the festival—founded to amplify its message—will serve as a beacon championing the best of the blues to have emerged from the Bayou State throughout time.
“This is just a sampling of what we can do and will do once [the LMHE] is built and once we’re operating full-time with a permanent home base. This is just the tip of the iceberg as to what can happen—not only for Louisianians and people who live in New Orleans, but also all those tourists, all those visitors to New Orleans and to Louisiana,” Santelli underscored. “This has the capabilities of really becoming a landmark must-see destination in New Orleans and Louisiana in general.”
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