Mardi Gras 2001

I love going to Mardi Gras in Acadiana. It is such a wonderful mix of music, dance, culture, local traditions, partying, family, fabulous cuisine, street food and reunion with friends. In fact, the more I go, the more I value the extended family that has been built on our shared outsider's love of this vibrant Cajun-Creole culture.

After a harrowing start, where I was bumped off my flight connection to Lafayette & told I was going to have to spend Friday night in Dallas, I was allowed to board the plane just as they were closing the doors. Others had similar rough starts getting into Lafayette. Luckily it was uphill from there.

As with the other Mardi Gras's I've attended, there were multiple things to do each day, so you had to make choices between parades, courirs, trail rides, Cajun and zydeco clubs, street dances, zydeco breakfasts, folk festivals and other tempting events. You can't possibly do it all, so when you ran into a friend, the first thing you asked was "where ya been?' and 'where ya goin'?"  A brief (and incomplete) listing of bands playing during the 5 days I was in the area included, for Cajun Music: Jambalaya, Lee Benoit, T-Mamou, Don Fontenot, Kevin Naquin, Steve Riley, Balfa Toujours, Walter Mouton, Le Bande Feufollet, File, Bradley Venable, Hadley Castille, Scotty Pousson, Sheryl Cormier, Joe Simon, Hunter Hayes, Mark & Ann Savoy, and Richard LeBouef; and for Zydeco: Chris Ardoin, J. Paul Jr., Keith Frank, Zydeco Force, Brad Randall, Horace Trahan, Willis Prudhomme, John Wilson, Step Rideau, Terry & the Bad Boys and Chubby Carrier.

Everyone experiences Mardi Gras in his or her own way. Some of my personal highlights from this trip were, in no particular order:

Balfa Toujours at Whiskey River.   Balfa Toujours played their hearts out in front of an enthusiastic, and packed home town audience, that included lots of visitors. Angelle's Whiskey River Landing is on the levy of the Atchafalaya Basin and behind the stage is a picture window of the swamp. There was not much room to dance but the music and energy from the crowd made up for it. Young Courtney Granger, a great-nephew of the Balfa Brothers, has developed quite a stage presence and is featured front and center in the band these days. The double fiddle numbers he played with Kevin Wimmer were outstanding. The crowd went wild each of the three times Balfa Toujours played the Mardi Gras song, the last time wearing Mardi Gras masks. The music became so inspiring that, in the middle of a dance, both myself and my partner simultaneously stopped dancing and started watching the band… the music was THAT good and dancing became a distraction. Let me tell you, that has NEVER happened to me before. As the sunset over the swamp shown through the windows and the band called forth their joyous music, I thought it doesn’t get much better than this.

The Church Point Courir and Mardi Gras Dance at their Saddle Club. This was a lucky bit of serendipity. Our plans for the morning were to go to Eunice to see Kevin Nacquin. Unfortunately I mixed up the start time with the end time of his set, so we needed other plans for the afternoon. A fortuitous tip send us to Church Point. When we got there, we were the only outsiders at the local Saddle Club. A very talented young accordion player, Bradley Venable, was on stage and we danced among ourselves and with the locals.  I watched in curiosity as a local man scattered cornmeal from a bag on the dance floor (to make it more slick?)  Later a few more dance gypsies showed up. Halfway through our stay, the courir started returning to town. This is a smaller version of the Eunice parade, with riders on horseback and Mardi Gras decorated flatbeds pulled by trailers hauling party-goers and  port-o-potties. I was fortunate to have a local resident explain to me some of the local traditions and urge her friends passing by in the courir to throw beads to her visitor from California. Because of this I caught more beads here than I have any other Mardi Gras festivity I've ever attended. Afterwards, the riders came into the dance and Don Fontenot took the stage, interrupted by an award ceremony, which included one award for the person who caught the most chickens during the run. One detail from the Saddle Club facility: the restrooms were labeled Fillies and Studs!

J. Paul Jr. at Hamilton's Club. This was the dance I was most looking forward to and it didn’t disappoint. J. Paul is a very talented musician, who during the evening started with traditional tunes, including Boozoo's Uncle Bud. As the evening wore on, he progressively funked it up playing driving, compelling, gospel and hip-hop tinged music that I find very progressive and wildly exciting.  In my opinion, he is the one of the most creative forces in zydeco today, and is moving the music forward in the same way that, most recently, Beau Jocque and Keith Frank did before him. It's not that he can't play the traditional repertoire, as he amply demonstrated, but, as he sang when he closed the show with "Where My Soldiers At", a tribute song to the zydeco masters before him, he sees himself carrying the torch of the zydeco tradition and moving forward with it.  I see J Paul breathing new vigor into the music and keeping it fresh, vital and relevant to the younger audience. And in fact, a good part of the audience consisted of his younger fans who shouted, chanted and screamed their approval of his performance.  J Paul Jr. also appears to be more comfortable with himself and confident himself on stage. He does less posturing and has eliminated most of the long, self-aggrandizing introductions to songs that broke the momentum of his stage show the last time I saw him.  Instead, during the 4 hour set he played without a break, he just moves from tune to tune, with few pauses in between. The flow of his performance has improved immensely because of this. J Paul is so talented he really didn't need those James Brown build-ups. Now his music stands tall on its own merits. Several of my friends who couldn't understand why I have been raving about this band for the last year, came up to me after the show, and said they now knew.

The traditional Mardi Gras Folklife Festival at Tee Mamou (Iota). Iota puts on a great small town Mardi Gras party. With traditional Cajun bands on the main stage, lots of traditional food and crafts booths, and a children's music tent, this is a great town to experience a traditional country Mardi Gras. The highlight of the day for me was the arrival of the Tee Mamou courir, when the costumed adult and children celebrants come up separately on the stage, wildly costumed in screen masks and capuchons, to chant the traditional Mardi Gras song and beg for coins (in exchange for candy). First almost 100 children in costumes climbed up onto stage. On the side, men in masks with whips, ordered them into circles. The children started pounding the floor and chanting. Then they started breaking up the concentric circles and moving towards the edge of the stage. They pounded the floor some more and held out their hands begging f or coins. If they got one, they threw you a candy. This ritual was repeated by the adults. Although I am unclear about the precise background of this particular tradition (I think it may be a variation on begging for ingredients for gumbo), it was fascinating to watch.

Café des Amis Zydeco (no) Breakfast with John Wilson & the House Rockers. The wait was so long by 8:30 AM that we never got breakfast here, but the Saturday morning Zydeco breakfast at Café Des Amis is an annual hightlight. The restaurant is packed with dancers (and non-dancing tourists) who take up every square inch of space between the tables to zydeco from 8:30 to noon. This year's music was provided by John Wilson and the House Rockers, who play in the traditional zydeco style. As one of the 1^st weekend events, this is also a great time to find out who is in town for Mardi Gras.

Zydeco Force at Ville Platte. The band sounded great and lots of dancers made the trip worthwhile. Jeffrey Broussard's ability to mimic Beau Jocque still gives me chills. I also admired the "K-Jon" signs on the port-o-potties.

The Krewe de Canaille Mardi Gras celebration with File at Randol's. This event was an unexpected delight. A formal ceremony commenced, in which the Krewe, festivally clad in glittering purple, green and gold costumes marched out. Then the jester, prince and princess, and then king and queen from this and last year 's Mardi Gras were introduced. Some of the group performed a pantomine while a Mardi Gras story was read. When File played the Mardi Gras song, the particpants second linee in concentric circles and the lights reflecting off their costomes twinkled in a most delightful way.

Keith Frank at El Sido's. I still can't figure out how Keith Frank managed to tame the poor acoustics at El Sido's, but he did and sounded great. No booming bass or thumping drums… just good clean vocal harmonies and tones dominated the evening. During the refrain of one song, Keith sounded like he was yodelling around the melody line. It was virtuouso singing.

Chris Ardoin at Soileau. The town of Soileau is so small it is not even on the map. The Mardi Gras party is held at the end of the community's trail ride in the community center. This year, there were fewer out-of-towners attending than last, and the townsfolks were less surprised by our presence. It made for a mellower event. I also had the pleasure of meeting Lawrence "Black" Ardoin, Chris's father, at the dance, who's 1984 CD with Edward Pouillard (Danny's brother) on Arhoolie Records is a wonderful traditional Creole recording. Black now manages his son's band, who adds to the tradition by playing pumped up original material and occassionally some mainstream rock songs adapted to a zydeco beat. Chirs was in fine form this evening.

And of course, Steve Riley  & the Mamou Playboys were there to close Mardi Gras  day festivities at Eunice:

Favorite Quote: "Richard's Club is a Feng Shui nightmare." (told to a newcomer who was having a hard time trying to figure out how to settle in her first time at Richard's Club.)

Best meals: Dinner at Café Des Amis in Breaux Bridge and at Don's Seafood Hut in Lafayette (still gets my vote for best gumbo).

And last but not least, visiting with all the folks I know in the area and from around the country. As I was getting on my flight home this time, I was really sad to leave. Not just because I would miss the music and the dancing, but also because I've made a lot of great friendships and, sentimental me, I was wishing the extended dance community wasn't quite so extended during the rest of the year. Until next time, Happy Mardi Gras and laissez les bons temp rouler to y'all!.