The march toward summer

There is a point in the springtime when the heat index starts to rise and the temperate, comfortable days of April and early May begin the oppressive march toward the high heat and high humidity of summer. The days when a fan seems adequate to cool a room start to slide into a succession of sticky, moist days when only air conditioning, a cool iced tea, lemonade or a cold treat like a snowball offer any respite from the relentless heat. This is New Orleans after all. Louis Armstrong's jazz standard "When It's Sleepy Time Down South" and George Gershwin's "Summertime" suggest a laissez faire attitude by most folks down here. That attitude might well be attributed to the high heat and humidity that abounds here starting in May and which lasts until October or later. When one moves from an air conditioned building into the outdoor heat, the rush of hot air is almost overwhelming. Eyeglasses immediately fog and an automobile seems more like an oven than a mode of transportation. Yet for all of these minor annoyances there is little doubt that few of us would exchange that indominable heat for any of those snowbound days of winter the northern folk face with snowblowers, scrapers and shovels in hand. Ah, yes, the dog days of summer are nearly here, but thank goodness for that heat. It makes me appreciate what passes for winter down here all the more and I look to the fall for relief from the onslaught of summer. As near as I can figure it, that should be sometime around Halloween.

The winding down of Jazz Fest

Nothing can take the joy out of a Jazz Fest and spin it into a muddy mess quite like severe thunderstorms. In April or May it's always a crap shoot as to whether or not the weather will prove to be overly kind and mild or excessively stern and challenging. A rapid moving thunderstorm with heavy downbursts of wind and rain can take a pleasant day and suddenly make it a horrid experience. True musiclovers will allow little to deter them from their enjoyment of the performances, but for those of us used to creature comforts like dryness and the ability to move about unfettered by mud and slop, it's a real challenge. Yesterday's mid-afternoon downbursts did their best to bring down the spirits of the huge crowd gathered at the historic Fair Grounds. But try as the rain did, the sun reappeared for a bit and the party went on. The ground was soaked so quickly that water gathered in pools adjacent to walkways and near the entrances of the tents erected to protect the smaller crowds gathered to hear gospel, contemporary jazz and traditional jazz. Like Jimmy Buffet's "Margaritaville" suggests flip flops were blown out in record numbers following the storm as they became mired in the muck stirred up by rain and refuse from the crowds. When the Radiators and the Neville Brothers finished up their sets at 7:00 p.m. (the Radiators ended a tad early), the crowd was largely smiling and happy. It was, after all, Jazz Fest and it could have been the best one so far.

Israel Independence Day

Preparing the "Cantorial Soloist" toss is Beignet Yisroel (from left: Cantors Michael Shochet and Jordan Franzel with Rabbi David Bockman. Victoria May is in the foreground.)

Getting ready for the 61st birthday of Israel is not that hard if you go by the English calendar. It's always the same date, May 14, which is the date that the State of Israel was announced by David Ben Gurion in 1948. But the date on the Hebrew calendar is almost always the 5th of Iyar (Yom Ha'atzmaut) and always follows Israeli Memorial Day (Yom Hazikaron). If the 5th of Iyar falls on a Friday or Saturday, the celebration is pushed back to the preceding Thursday with Yom Hazikaron held on Wednesday. If the 5th of Iyar falls on a Monday, the celebration is pushed forward so that it occurs on a Tuesday. This is to protect the sanctity of the Sabbath, which won't allow a sad day of memorial to run directly after it ends. So, Israeli Memorial Day must fall on a Monday after an interceding day between it and the Sabbath. This year the date of Yom Ha'Atzmaut was May 3 on the Gregorian calendar and, while the celebrations were not as pronounced as those for the 60th anniversary of the Jewish state, they were held in earnest and with gusto. This year a number of former New Orleanians gathered to make the celebration even more special by appearing on stage at Conservative synagogue Shir Chadash. This was the singing group Beignet Yisroel composed of two cantors, a rabbi and a cantorial soloist. Beignet (pronounced BEN-yay) is a term for a famous New Orleans delicacy, a square donut without a hole that is covered in confectioner's sugar. Typically sold at tourist havens like Cafe du Monde, beignets are best served hot like the group named after them. Beignet Yisroel was formed in the 1990s when its members were all working in New Orleans. Cantor Michael Shochet was the cantor at Temple Sinai, a Reform synagogue. Jordan Franzel was the cantor at sister Reform temple Touro Synagogue, while Conservative Rabbi David Bockman was a trumpet player who loved to perform at Chevra Thillim. Shochet has moved to Falls Church, Virginia, where he is presently employed as the senior cantor at Rodef Shalom. Franzel moved to Lafayette Hill, Pennsylvania where he now works as Congregation Or Ami's cantor. After leaving New Orleans, Bockman moved away to Raleigh, North Carolina, where he served as pulpit rabbi for several years. Now he makes Temple Beth Shalom of Teaneck, New Jersey his home. All three came back for a performance with Cantorial Soloist Victoria May of Congregation Gates of Prayer. May more than holds her own as the sole member of the distaff side of singers and performers. In the time since Bockman, Franzel and Shochet moved away, Chevra Thillim merged with Tikvat Shalom to become Shir Chadash, where their concert was held. Beignet Yisroel performs Jewish music with heavy influences from New Orleans music. It's great to see these Jewish spiritual leaders and musicians return to their former haunt to entertain the city's community for whom they apparently still have many feelings.

Storer Boone Awards

The seventeenth annual Storer Boone Awards, sometimes referred to as "the Boonies," were held last night at Le Chat Noir, the swank cabaret that has been the host for the awards ceremonies that honor local theatre for the past eight of those years. Le Chat's gracious hostess Barbara Motley and local actor Brian Peterson served as emcees. As expected, it was a night of revelry for many of the productions that had previously been hailed at the Big Easy Theatre Awards in March. Among the best of the most acknowledged productions were the controversial Stephen Sondheim musical "Assassins" and the gripping drama "Coyote on a Fence." Michael Aaron Santos, Anchie Joachim and Jason Kilpatrick repeated for Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Supporting Actor in a Drama ("Coyote on a Fence"), respectively. This time out, Santos's wife, Ashley Ricord, won for Best Director of a Drama, making it a clean sweep for "Coyote." Ricord also picked up a "Boonie" for her InsideOut/NOLA Project role in "Sideman" as Best Actress in a Drama, making her a double winner of both Big Easy Theatre and Storer Boone Awards. It should be apparent that the young upstarts of Inside Out Productions and the NOLA Project, who began only a few short years ago, have little else to prove. They are at the pinnacle of success. It was Le Petit du Vieux Carre and the NOLA Project's "Assassins" that garnered most of the other big wins for the night. Jimmy Murphy and Lisa Picone won Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress in a Musical for their roles in "Assassins" and A. J. Allegra won the nod as Best Director of a Musical. All three won Big Easy Awards last month. Of course, "Assassins" was given the nod for Best Musical outright. Other "Assassins" winners were Jefferson Turner as for Musical Director, Eli Grove and Kyle Herbert for Best Set Design, and Cecile Casey Covert for Best Costume Design. Another winner for the night was the Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre's production of "Rent" which garnered Best Lighting Design honors for Scott Sauber and Nancy Macko and Best Sound Design for Cliff Stromeyer. Other winners who reprised Big Easy wins were Meredith Long for Best Actress in a Musical ("Ruthless, The Musical"), Natalie Boyd for Best Actress in a Comedy ("Speech & Debate"), Aimee Hayes for Best Director of a Comedy ("Speech & Debate") and Karen Hebert for Best Choregraphy ("Cabaret"). The Best Comedy of 2008 was "Speech & Debate" and Ricky Graham and Sean Patterson's zany "Renew Revue" about recovery in a post-Katrina environment was given the award for Best Origianl Play. Other winners were Laura Jean Hoffpauir for Best Stage Manager and Alex Lemonier for Best Performance by a Child ("The History Boys"). "A Kingdom of Statues," another joint production of the NOLA Project and Le Petit du Vieux Carre won the award for Best Children's play. The big honors of the night were handed out to Deborah Bell as the Arthur Tong Unsung Hero Award and to local luminary Lyla Hay Owen as the 2009 Storer Boone Lifetime Achievement Award. There were two performances of note throughout the night. The first by Lisa Picone of "Surabaya Santa" from 2 Left Feet's production of "Songs for a New World" was absolutely hysterical. Picone was on top of her game. The second half opened with a rousing number from FourFront Productions' "Altar Boyz." This was timed fortuitously just prior to the reprise of that show opening soon at Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre. What made this night special was that it was the New Orleans area theatre community coming together and voting for themselves. Unlike the Big Easy Awards, which are nominated by committees, the nominations and final votes for the Storer Boone Awards come from the rank and file of actors, actresses, directors, producers, technicians, stage managers, etc. They are tabulated online at Stageclick.com and in several cases this year some of the categories were decided by one vote. In some cases the winner's margin was only by two votes.

Jazz Fest Shabbat

Marcia Ball with her small fan at Jazz Fest Shabbat

Every year, typically the fourth Friday of April, Touro Synagogue has held a Jazz Fest Shabbat, an opportunity to put Jewish liturgical music and worship and counterpoise it with the music associated with the Jazz Fest, whether that be contemporary, New Orleans rhythm and blues, klezmer or more traditional jazz. Last year Kermit Ruffins held sway in the huge sanctuary and, because of the dates for Passover conflicting with the first weekend, it took place on the second weekend of the festival, closer to the first week in May. Ruffins did a fantastic job getting the entire audience to move up towards the front and dance up and down the aisles prior to the worship services portion of the program. I didn't think anyone else could do as great a job until last night. And I am thankful to reveal to you all that I was wrong! Marcia Ball, the best female pianist to play New Orleans style music took command of the bimah where her band joined her as she tickled the electric ivories. She made the audience feel so happy to be there and to really get into the spirit of the services in a meaningful way. Now for my observant Jewish friends, I am sure there is little I could do to convince them that playing music on Shabbat or using electricity to amplify it could be justified. But for those of us who are a bit more liberal in our approach to tefilah (prayer), it was a revelation. After all, it is Jazz Fest and things are just a bit different during these days. The Jazz Fest Shabbat is in its 16th year, having been formed originally by the late Cantor Stephen Dubov, an amazing man, singer and religious leader who left us way too early. Cantor Dubov was a personal friend of mine and consoled my son and I on the evening of my wife's passing, a mitzvah that I will never forget. After Dubov left New Orleans other cantors have come and gone, but it seems to me that none have taken on the post of coordinating Jazz Fest Shabbat any better than Touro's present cantor Billy Tiep. Billy gets it and he pours himself into each concert. I offer him my heartfelt thanks for a truly moving experience that most everyone agreed was the best we'd ever seen. I can't wait to see how he tops this one next year.

The Jazz Fest is coming! The Jazz Fest is coming!

If one lives anywhere near the Big Easy at the end of April or beginning of May, chances are he or she will end up at the Jazz Fest. The fact is that the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, better known colloquially as the Jazz Fest, is one huge event. Culturally, it is one of the best things that goes on in New Orleans, but make no mistake about it: it costs plenty to attend. It has come a long way in 40 years from its small gathering of mostly traditional musicians gathered downtown near the old Congo Square to the five days stretched out over two weekends drawing as many as 90,000 fans a day. At $50 per person for admittance and food averaging at about $5 per item and beers selling for $3 each, it doesn't take long to rack up a lot of damage in a short period. And, of course, that's only part of the story. Hotel rooms are packed to capacity at their highest rates before the summertime and restaurants have most of their tables filled over the course of the run of the festival. But it's not the arts, crafts or culture that most endears the Jazz Fest to attendees. In a word it's the music. There is literally something from everyone at the Jazz Fest from punk rock to hard rock to contemporary jazz to beebop to gospel to klezmer to Cajun to zydeco to folk to bluegrass to rhythm and blues to funk. There probably has been no one who wasn't at least pleased with some aspect of the music played at the various stages located at the historic Fair Grounds every year for the past nearly four decades (the first few years the venue was held away from the present location). So, here's to Jazz Fest: 40 years and still going strong!

Yom Hashoah

Today marks the date that we recall the victims of the Holocaust, known in Hebrew as The Shoah. Yom Hashoah, which is a day of remembrance of the victims of the Holocaust, is celebrated worldwide, but noted for the poignant observance of two minutes of silence in the morning throughout the land of Israel. On a given signal, everyone stops what they are doing and stands in silence, frozen in time as they consider all of the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust and the other millions killed during this horrible time of man's inhumanity to man. It is ironic this year that Yom Hashoah follows the date which Nazi sympathizers use as their clarion call, the birthdate of Adolf Hitler. The two killers at Columbine chose that date for their venous crimes in the hope that other like-minded men of hate would rally around their misdeeds. It is good there was no such movement and their crimes of hate were seen more as the desperate measures of criminals, than the brave or courageous actions they had mistakenly believed others would view their heinous and sociopathic acts. It is incredible to think that ten years have passed since that horrific day or that more than 70 years have elapsed since Kristallnacht ("The Night of the Broken Glass") when coordinated, outrageous acts of hooliganism and thugism were perpetrated against helpless Jews and others. If history has taught us anything, it is that hate in all its searing manifestations will rise to challenge man and it is up to the dedicated actions of brave, righteous souls to take it on with all the strength they can muster. Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel went even went further. He said that inaction was terrible, but that apathy was even worse. This is true at Virginia Tech, where two years ago another madman's twisted actions left 31 souls in his sick wake to mourn, making Columbine look like a veritable walk in the park. It is true in countries that would forsake the sanctity of people to live peaceably as in Sudan's Darfur region. It is true in Gaza where rockets rain down on Israeli settlements in a daily barrage of hate. It is true in Iran where leaders advocate against the right of Israel to exist while slowly working towards gaining the mastery of horrible weaponry that could be used to launch yet another Holocaust against Jews. And, sadly, it is true in the hearts of others who spurn the spark of human kindness and fear of God, putting themselves above others as a mockery of the Divine. So for one moment think about the vast blanket of hate that enveloped the world seven decades ago under the banner of hate and consider the souls of the one and a half million children whose lives were extinguished as a result. Then think about the contributions to society they might have made were they not cut down so early in their youth. We are still paying the cost for the consequences of the Holocaust today even while other men of hate lay in wait hoping to kill, maim and torture those whose lives they despise. As Elie Wiesel reminds us, the worst sin we can commit is simply not to care.