Organizers have announced the dates and lineup for the rescheduled 2022 Danny Barker Banjo and Guitar Festival. Postponed in January due to a spike in COVID infections, the eighth annual festival is now set for a five-day run from March 16–20 and will again offer a mix of live music performances, interviews, and panel discussions.

The New Orleans Jazz Museum  will host concerts and events on Friday, March 18,  and Sunday, March 20, (by admission at $15 each day) while a free day of music will get underway at the National Park Service French Quarter Visitors Center on Saturday, March 19. The festival will also include school clinics, workshops, a patron party to kickoff the festival on the evening of Wednesday, March 16, at The Terrell House, including live music, hors d’oeuvres, drinks, silent auction ($45 individual – $75 couple). A Tribute to Danny and Blu Lu Barker will be held at Snug Harbor on Friday, March 18, with shows at 8 and 10 p.m. featuring Topsy Chapman and an all-star band led by Dr. Michael White.

Advance one-day or two-day passes for March 18 and 20 may be purchased here or at the festival gate.

FESTIVAL SCHEDULE

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 16

6 p.m. – Patron Party at the Terrell House, 1441 Magazine Street (Tickets: $45 individual, $75 couples)

THURSDAY, MARCH 17

12 p.m. – Master Class at University of New Orleans with Catherine Russell and Don Vappie, Robert E. Nims Performing Arts Center, 2000 Lakeshore Drive (Included in purchase of a festival day pass)

2:30 p.m. – Clinic at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts with Michael Pellera, Seva Venet and Mahmoud Chouki, 2800 Chartres Street (Included with purchase of a festival day pass)

4 p.m. – Screening of the documentary City of a Million Dreams, New Orleans Jazz Museum, 400 Esplanade Avenue, followed by a panel discussion with director Jason Berry and jazz musicians Fred Johnson, Gregg Stafford and Dr. Michael White (Admission: $10)

FRIDAY, MARCH 18

PERFORMANCE CENTER STAGE (third floor, New Orleans Jazz Museum)

11:30 a.m. – Tom McDermott and Meschiya Lake
12:30 p.m. – Steve Pistorius Band
1:30 p.m. – Wendell Brunious Band
2:30 p.m. – Herlin Riley Quartet
3:30 p.m. – George and Gerald French and Band

FRONT LAWN STAGE (outdoors, New Orleans Jazz Museum)

10 a.m. – Brass Band Parade and Sons of Jazz Brass Band
11 a.m. – Shannon Powell Quartet
12 p.m. – Charmaine Neville Band
1 p.m. – Mark Brooks Quartet
2 p.m. – Gregg Stafford and the Jazz Hounds
3 p.m. – Don Vappie and Grio Trio
4 p.m. – Kermit Ruffins and the Barbecue Swingers

SNUG HARBOR (626 Frenchmen Street)

8 p.m. – Danny Barker Birthday Bash with Topsy Chapman and The Danny Barker Tribute Band featuring Dr. Michael White, Herman LeBeaux and Steve Pistorius. For tickets, visit here.

SATURDAY,  MARCH 19

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE FRENCH QUARTER VISITOR CENTER (419 Decatur Street)

11 a.m. – Jamil Sharif
12 p.m. – Al “Carnival Time” Johnson
1 p.m. – Joe Hall & The Louisiana Cane Cutters
2 p.m. – Les Getrex
3 p.m. – Jimmy Bean Ballero
4 p.m. – The Lawrence Cotton Legendary Experience

SUNDAY, MARCH 20

PERFORMANCE CENTER STAGE (third floor, New Orleans Jazz Museum)

11:30 a.m. – Topsy Chapman and Solid Harmony
12:30 p.m. – Sharon Martin with the Danny Barker Tribute Band
1:30 p.m. – Bruce “Sunpie” Barnes and Band
2:30 p.m. – Mari Watanabe
3:30 p.m. – Steve Masakowski Family

FRONT LAWN STAGE

11 a.m. – Brass Band Parade featuring the Hot 8 Brass Band and a Salute to Bennie Pete
12 p.m. – Seva Venet Band
1 p.m. – John Boutté
2 p.m. – Mahmoud Chouki Trio (interview)
4 p.m. – Treme Brass Band with the Black Men of Labor and the Baby Dolls

TALKIN’ DANNY BARKER 

The festival will feature two days of great stories about—and (on tape) from Danny Barker—plus highlights of Danny and Blu Lu Barker’s recorded canon – in the New Orleans Jazz Museum’s Education Center on the first floor.

FRIDAY, MARCH 18

12 p.m. – Danny Barker Talks and Plays will include select excerpts from a half dozen interviews with Danny Barker, plus a sampling of great recordings by Danny and Blu Lu Barker, with radio producer and host Fred Kasten.

1 p.m. – Interview with Don Vappie, a musician, composer and educator. He is the 2021 Steve Martin Banjo Prize Winner and will be inducted into the Banjo Hall of Fame in September 2022. In addition, he has received awards for his contributions to the preservation of New Orleans Creole culture through music and film.

2 p.m. – Danny Barker: Cultural Advocate and Educator will include community activist Fred Johnson and educator Jonathan Bloom in a discussion with Fred Kasten.

3 p.m. – Danny and Blu Lu Barker Take on the Big Apple | In their three plus decades on the scene in New York, the Barkers were important members of a creative community that included Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, Danny’s uncle Paul Barbarin, and Barbarin’s song-writing partner Luis Russell.  Grammy-winning vocalist Catherine Russell (Luis Russell’s daughter) and jazz historian Paul Kahn will discuss the Barkers’ time in New York with Fred Kasten.

4 p.m. – Video of Danny and Blu Lu will feature selections from the Hogan Jazz Archive’s Barker Collection at Tulane University. Filmmakers Matt and Melissa Martinez will present select video segments with the Barkers.

SUNDAY, MARCH 20

12 p.m. – Danny, Jelly Roll and the Dirty Dozen | Grammy-winning producer Scott Billington will discuss his forthcoming book, Making Tracks: A Record Producer’s Southern Roots Music Journey, with Fred Kasten. Billington will read selections that deal with studio sessions with Danny Barker as he worked on two recordings with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Jelly and The New Orleans Album. Billington will also play taped highlights of his interviews with Barker from those sessions.

1 p.m. – Leroy Jones, the Fairview Baptist Church Band, and the Brass Band Revival will feature a conversation with New Orleans trumpeter and composer Leroy Jones. He was Danny Barker’s first recruit for the Fairview Baptist Church Marching Band, an ensemble that sparked a revival of brass bands in the Crescent City that continues more than 50 years later. Jones discusses the impact of Danny Barker on his career with journalist and author Keith Spera.

2 p.m. – Gregg Stafford, Danny Barker and the Jazz Hounds | Trumpeter and vocalist Gregg Stafford will discuss his long association with Danny and Blu Lu Barker—from the Fairview Baptist Church Marching Band to the Jazz Hounds and beyond—with long-time WWOZ jazz programmer and host Sally Young.

3 p.m. – Danny Barker: His legacy is marching on! | Clarinetist, composer and educator Dr. Michael White and composer and educator Roger Dickerson will discuss Danny Barker’s ongoing legacy in New Orleans and beyond with interviewer and producer Fred Kasten.

4 p.m. – Tribute to author and New Orleans Jazz Museum founder Don Marquis | Jazz historian Charles Chamberlain, retired steamboat captain and calliope player Doc Hawley, writer and film director Daniel Pritzker(Bolden), curator Patrick Burns and journalist Geraldine Wyckoff will join Fred Kasten in a discussion about the many contributions to the documenting of jazz in New Orleans and New Orleans culture made by late author, historian and Jazz Museum founder Don Marquis who died on July 29, 2021, at age 88.

For more information about the Danny Barker Banjo and Guitar Festival, visit here.