Music in New Orleans

Outer Journey: Street Bands and Parades

Within approaching a few blocks of the French Quarter, sounds from brass instruments, drums and guitars starts to float through the air. The people that set up their props on the street corners always seemed to have a crowd gathered around them. There was a man in a prom style dress playing his guitar and singing, and we also saw groups of 5 or 6 playing in rhythm. Since New Orleans is known as the birthplace of jazz, that is typically the type of music being played. Musicians that play jazz tend to play the music from their soul, and may not use sheet music as the song goes on. This is all part of the interpretative feelings of the music. Each musician finds a style that expresses who they are so it would be hard to find a similar tune the next block down. There are musicians that blast their instrument so loud that they look as if their lungs may explode but they keep playing without missing a breath or the next note. The smiles on their faces show how much they love what they do for the people that gather around them and the applause and cheering from the crowd shows the excitement in return. Even though jazz is most popular, I also heard rock and roll or the slower sounds of blues or country coming from bars and restaurants. No matter the genre, I always found myself moving to the rhythm in some way. Since New Orleans was founded with such diverse roots I believe that is how music is still represented in the city today.

There were a few times that music caught my attention and I would have to look around to find where it was all of a sudden coming from. It is common for parades to appear out of nowhere. Small parades will celebrate birthdays, weddings or funerals. These parades were never long but each had bands to attract attention for whoever was celebrating.

Inner Journey: Jazz Museum

Going to the Jazz Museum at first did not seem interesting to me. I had done research on music for the blogs already and didn't want to walk around reading pages and pages of history. There was a lot of historical information about how different genres were started or about specific musicians. 

One of the rooms with information about the first instruments was intriguing. From my first music classes in elementary school we learned about simple items to use as instruments, and almost every toddler finds something to bang on to make noise. Walking around the streets I noticed a few people carrying around 5 gallon buckets with drum sticks or an old wash board. The origins of music is string today.

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The exhibit we walked into last was about for Louis Prima. At first I had no idea who this even was. There were numerous boards of information, displays of clothing, pictures of him and other people. It wasn't until I got towards the back wall that I recognized something very familiar and I got excited! He sang the song "wanna be like you" for the Disney movie Jungle Book. That was one of my favorite movies as a child. I was interested in this display for sure. This shows that everyone can find a connection to something, through memories and experiences that they have.