On Friday, October 1, 2021, Ace Hotel New Orleans and their live music venue Three Keys will host Helping Hand, a benefit concert for Hurricane Ida relief in which 100 percent of ticket sales will go to Culture Aid, a NOLA-based organization that provides fresh meals to those in need.
With a stellar lineup representing New Orleans music from funk to jazz, the benefit show will be headlined by funk group Water Seed, with performances by Big Sam and Bo Dollis Jr. and The Wild Magnolias. Tickets start at $45 for entry, with a second tier available for those looking to up their donation to $100, which will include two drinks and a snack on Three Keys.
Doors for Helping Hand will open at 7 p.m., and tickets can be purchased here.
Water Seed is a progressive innovative band that dares to bring musicianship, dexterity and creativity to funk, soul, R&B, fusion, and future funk. In 2017 the band scored their first Billboard chart-rankinh album, We Are Stars. The following year they scored big with the release of their album Say Yeah, which debuted on four Billboard charts reaching number 17 on the R&B chart.
“Big Sam” Williams is a trombonist and band leader from New Orleans, Louisiana. He has been a member of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band and leads Big Sam’s Funky Nation. In his youth he studied with saxophonist Kidd Jordan and at New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. In his teens, Williams was a founding member of the Stooges Brass Band and joined the Dirty Dozen, allowing him to play with Karl Denson, Dave Matthews, Widespread Panic, and James Brown. After one year with the Dirty Dozen, he began a side project broadening his musical ambitions. In 2006, he played with Elvis Costello and Allen Toussaint on their album The River in Reverse and tour.
Gerard “Bo Jr.” Dollis is Big Chief of the Wild Magnolias and the son of the legendary Bo Dollis. The elder Dollis literally brought Mardi Gras Indian music into the recording industry in 1970 with his single “Handa Wanda,” the first Mardi Gras Indian song not about the history or ritual of what had been up until then an essentially secret society. My Name Is Bo is Bo Jr.’s debut album and is historic in scope, uniting current and generational Mardi Gras Indian musicians in a sweeping overview of the music’s history and its place in the New Orleans music pantheon. It is also the first LP released by Gallatin Street Records from the studio of the New Orleans Jazz Museum.
