Sunday night being off time for both me and Big Man, we decided to make it a busman's holiday by going out to hear music after the parades last Sunday. (There were 2 daytime parades on Sunday, January 27th: Krewe of Carrollton and Krewe of King Arthur; the sun broke through and shone on both parades, and a good time was had by all.) After checking the copious listings for live music in the city (on a Sunday night!), we settled on the Maple Leaf Bar Uptown on Oak Street, where blues guitarist Walter "Wolfman" Washington was playing in a trio with drummer Russell Batiste and keyboardist Joe Krown.
Other than plans to hear great local music, we had an ulterior motive for the choice -- Big Man is acquainted with a saxophonist who played for years and years with Wolfman, and the sax man has been trying to introduce the two to each other but the timing never worked out. Big Man thought he could introduce himself at the gig, mentioning the sax man's name. Seemed like a plan.
Getting ready to go, I found to my chagrin that I'm not as young as I like to think. The accumulated physical pressure of all the walking at 7 (count 'em, *7*!) parades since the first (rainy) one Friday night had blown my weak ankle (broken in a bad fall in 2001). Whether I liked it or not, and believe me, I didn't, the only way I was going to the Leaf that night was with a cane like an old lady. Geez.
The first set was advertised as starting at 10 pm, which we didn't believe, so we drove around looking at houses, trying to kill time, and finally parked across the street from the Leaf at about 10:10 pm. Entering, we were told the cover was $5 each, that the music would start in about a half-hour (so much for the listing in the paper!), and that the crawfish were out back. We looked at each other -- crawfish? We don't know nothin' 'bout no crawfish!
Parenthetical aside: Where else in America, or anywhere for that matter, can you go out, dressed casually, to hear really good live music on a Sunday night? And if you could, would it be a mere $5 a person? And even if, improbably, both of the first two were true, where else in heaven's good name could you get free boiled crawfish too? Only one place in the whole wide wonderful world, this place, this beloved old girl, this dear old wounded city. What a gift it is to live here.
Big Man bought me an Abita and himself a diet Coke, and we walked through to the patio bar in the back, where the pool table had been covered with a sheet of plywood which was topped with the detritus of a crawfish boil: small boiled crawfish, chunks of corn, small new potatoes, a few mushrooms, heads of garlic, halves of lemons (and oranges! never saw oranges in a crawfish before; take note for future reference), and lots and lots of picked-over crawfish shells. A few folks were standing around, peeling crawfish, sucking heads, picking through the debris looking for something, like the few pieces of hot sausage that were left. Seeing us arrive, someone said that another pot was boiling now and should be out soon, and noticing my cane, brought me a chair. (Maybe this old disabled lady routine is not all that bad.)
We picked and ate crawfish for a while, and then wandered back out to the main room, where the trio was slowly arriving and even more slowly setting up. Then an overwhelming aroma of fresh hot crawfish assailed our nostrils. Even though we had eaten a perfectly good dinner before arriving at the Maple Leaf, we hustled back to the crawfish pool table (another chair being provided for me by a young man calling me "sweetheart"), and ate some more. Everyone at the table agreed that the crawfish were early and way too small, almost too much trouble to eat, as we ate and ate.
Finally, in the general neighborhood of 10:45 pm or so, the band began to strike up a tune, and we went back to the tin-ceilinged main room, which was much more crowded than it had been earlier. I got a seat on one of the benches that line both sides of the room (again, the old disabled lady routine). The crowd was the usual Maple Leaf bunch: college kids, Baby Boomers, a few older folks, a few looking like their IDs hadn't been properly checked (but maybe that's just me -- 21 year-olds look so darn babyish!). The trio did not react much with the crowd; there were few announcements of song titles and such. They just stood up there on that little little-bitty stage and played their hearts out, tight and hot and New Orleans-inflected.
The first hour fly by, and the set ended before we knew it. Big Man followed the musicians outside to Oak Street to introduce himself and pass a few words, see if he could sit in. I stayed inside -- no point in me limping out there. Big Man popped back in to say that the sax man's name had been the right entree and he was going back to the car to get his horn, since they had invited him to sit in for a tune or two. He came back in with the small gig bag and began to discreetly warm up against the side wall with the mouthpiece and trumpet.
The trio came back on and played about 2 or 3 tunes, and then invited Eric to the stage. The remaining mike was behind Russell's drum kit, so Big Man stood back there, and played like he had been rehearsing with them. He blew sweet and pretty, and hot and high, and he added a little somethin' behind Wolfman's vocals. Wolfman and Joe Krown exchanged looks while Big Man blew, and the crowd responded to him with claps and cheers. He was a hit!
When the song finished, Big Man took a little bow and started to leave the stage. But Russell Batiste told him to stay (his actual words, I believe, were, "Don't go, man!") and Big Man ended by playing the rest of the set with them. Modestly, after every song, he made to go, but each time was prevented by a member of the trio.
At the end of the set, Russell Batiste asked Big Man, "Do you know 'Secondline'?" Big Man pointed down to where I was sitting, and said, "My wife's a native -- she MADE me learn it!" And then he proceeded to blow that old familiar start to "Secondline" -- BADA BAAAH-DA! And I and a few other people hollered back HEY! But Russell didn't think it got a big enough response, so he made Big Man blow again -- and again. But each time, it was only a few of us giving the response -- the crowd was obviously mostly out-of-towners who didn't know any better. So Russell gave Big Man the go-ahead and they went on to play the whole song, which the crowd danced to wildly and cheered and clapped when it was done. Joe Krown made a point of thanking Big Man and introducing him by name to the crowd, almost as if he had been a real member of the group.
As they began packing up to leave, the members of the trio made sure to get Big Man's contact info, so it's not impossible that he could, sometime soon, play the Leaf for real, and not just sitting in. But even so, it was a great time and it felt so good to see my Big Man on the stage of the Maple Leaf!
No comments:
Post a Comment