Happy holidays to all.

This issue is a momentous one for OffBeat, because it’s a celebration and a retrospective of our 25-year anniversary.

Frankly, friends and supporters of OffBeat, I am amazed at where this journey has taken me. I got it in my red head that music was a lot more important to New Orleans and Louisiana than anyone gave it credit for, and stubbornly, I gave birth to OffBeat (it was pretty much as painful as a real birth, let me tell you). I hoped that, being media, it would help to positively influence the community’s attitude toward music and musicians.

It was more difficult than I anticipated: musicians still aren’t considered to be in the mainstream. Despite the fact that each one of them is an entrepreneur—albeit untrained and, in many cases, uneducated about their artistic business—musicians are still, for the most part, not appreciated for their greatness and contributions. Perhaps it’s because they are first and foremost artists, and as we know, artists aren’t exactly revered and supported in this country as they are in other countries. Shameful. Most people who play music will never make a good living; they struggle to get by; it’s only a few musical artists who reach superstar status and make real money. Then there’s the “lifestyle”: the occupational hazards of late nights; long and irregular hours; exposure to alcohol, cigarette smoke and drugs. But you’d think that in New Orleans, being a hospitality-immersed city, musicians would be accorded the same respect as someone who owns a restaurant, a bar, a hotel, or even a football quarterback. Not so. So here’s OffBeat’s mission in a nutshell: to promote music and to elevate musicians to a level where they are respected, appreciated, educated and healthy enough to continue to enchant and heal us with their art. Simple: not.

It’s been a long road, but I guess if I didn’t still love what I do, I’d be doing something else. Luckily, I’ve had a slew of people who have shared and participated in my dream, and are helping me to keep OffBeat out there every month, and every day on OffBeat.com, and every week in the Weekly Beat. The main one among them is my husband, Joseph Irrera, who joined OffBeat in 1996, and helped me straighten out our financial situation. Thank goodness we found each other, because I was certain I would never be able to find another person who could deal with as driven and bullheaded a person as I am. Thank you, honey, for being there for me and for us.

Over the years, I’ve had the privilege of knowing, training, collaborating and working with, educating and learning from some of the most talented, wonderful (and sometimes difficult) individuals you can imagine, way too many to name in this short column. I am forever grateful to all of you, and all of our advertisers who trust in what we do, for sharing in my dream and supporting us for a quarter century.