Music, mud and mayhem flow at New Orleans' bountiful Jazz Fest

NEW ORLEANS
As his fans slow-danced in a muddy slop under an unflinchingly gray sky last weekend, Ryan Adams let out a comment about how "wonderful" the setting was. It would have been interpreted as total snark at any other music fest, but not at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.

"It's an honor to play here," the typically coy and catty rocker added.

Roger Daltrey and Pete Town­shend similarly stepped out of character to take the Jazz Fest headlining slot last Saturday, the Who's first festival gig in many years.

"So much fresh air," the arena-bound Daltrey joked in mock wonder.

The reasons that Jazz Fest meets the approval of even the most seasoned or cynical rock stars — and is favored by festival-jaded rock fans such as yours truly — were easy to pin down last weekend after another dizzily paced run of the city's 46th annual musical parade at the New Orleans Fair Grounds. Nearly 10 years after the devastation and uncertainty left by Hurricane Katrina, the event still rises to the top.

Always held the last weekend of April and first weekend of May, Jazz Fest resumes Thursday with an unusual array of big names including Elton John, Ed Sheeran, Jerry Lee Lewis and No Doubt. The top names are usually way down on the list of reasons to go, though.

In the six-hour span before the Who took the stage Saturday, the fest's true stars had their day in the sun (alas, just figuratively speaking). They ranged from a 29-year-old purveyor of 100-year-old jazz tunes to a 60-member gospel choir, and from a hip indie-rock band in high-waisted mom jeans to a veteran Cajun band whose leader probably owns a lot of high-waisted waders.

The young old-school jazz star was a soprano sax player and third-generation NOLA musician named Calvin Johnson, who more than held his own beside guest trumpet star Irvin Mayfield as he led a tribute to jazz pioneer Buddy Bolden in the festival's Economy Hall Tent. Under the Gospel Tent, the multiracial and cross-generational Voices of Peter Claver from nearby St. Peter Claver Catholic Church had the audience sore from clapping and smiling along, most notably to Bishop Richard White's "I'm Glad I Don't Look Like What I've Been Through" — a perfect invocation of their post-Katrina resilience.

Over at the big-scale Gentilly Stage, the coed hippie-pop quartet Givers — a rock band that actually formed when Katrina displaced its members to Lafayette, La. — lived up to its hype and widespread public-radio play of the past year. Givers' sunny harmonies belied the weather, but the rustically rocking Bruce Daigrepont Cajun Band seemed made for the swampy setting of the Fais Do Do Stage, where fans waltzed in the mud.

Less surprising but equally defining of the event, better-known stars such as NOLA jazz patriarch Ellis Marsalis and hard-stomping South Carolina duo Shovels & Rope also gave last weekend's fest-goers something to remember.

Last weekend's after-party offerings in clubs — not officially affiliated with Jazz Fest but part of the experience — included a ballistic and bruising set by burgeoning hometown rocker Benjamin Booker at One Eyed Jacks in the French Quarter. Sacred-steel specialist Robert Randolph and his Family Band led a religiously rife 2 a.m. funk fest at Tipitina's, whose most noble purpose might have been working off all that body-and-soul-thickening festival concession food.

As for the more famous rock stars in town, Adams reiterated he means business nowadays after years of erratic performances. He pulled off elegant, stirring versions of "Oh My Sweet Carolina" and "Magnolia Mountain" and pulled out a deep cut he wrote in New Orleans, "Dirty Rain," all too perfect for the occasion.

Chris Riemenschneider • 612-673-4658