Satchmo SummerFest 2015 will celebrate 15 years of highlighting Louis Armstrong’s contributions to American music from July 30 through August 2, 2015.
But if you want to enjoy the music, you will have to pay $5 for admission this year—a first in the history of the formerly free festival.
French Quarter Festivals, Inc., which produces the festival, said in a statement that the $5 admission fee will be used to keep the quality of the event high and build towards growth and future expansion.
Satchmo SummerFest presented by Chevron will feature the music of over 100 artists representing New Orleans’ finest traditional and contemporary jazz musicians and brass bands. Regular performers include Deacon John and the Ivories, Ellis Marsalis, PresHall Brass, Kermit Ruffins, Lars Edegran, New Birth Brass Band, Rebirth Brass Band, Robin Barnes, and Yoshio Toyama and the Dixie Saints. “Satchmo in the Shade”—tented areas where festival-goers can enjoy music and food away from the summer heat—will be located at each stage.
In addition to music and education, Satchmo SummerFest showcases New Orleans’ indigenous traditions, such as a Sunday morning Jazz Mass at the historic St. Augustine Church in Treme; a traditional second line parade; and traditional jazz dance lessons. Other special events include an opening reception at the festival’s host hotel, the Omni Royal Orleans Hotel, and the annual Trumpet Tribute to close the festival. The festival also features authentic Creole cuisine from the area’s finest restaurants to create “Red Bean Alley.”
A full music schedule will be released in June.
On Thursday, July 30th, a special screening of the 1956 classic High Society will be held at Le Petit Théâtre du Vieux Carré as a fundraiser to benefit FQFI. Hats, gloves, and seersuckers are encouraged for this red carpet event. A limited number of tickets are available for $50 at fqfi.org. Admission will include refreshments.
This year’s Satchmo SummerFest will also bring the inaugural “Spirit of Satch” Awards. Winners will be champions of jazz in the areas of: music, media, philanthropy, and education, and announced at festival on Friday, July 31st.
August 2015 marks the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the levee failures that threatened to drown New Orleans. In commemoration, Satchmo SummerFest will remember and honor those who worked tirelessly to help rebuild the irreplaceable infrastructure that supports New Orleans music—those who comforted, gave housing, replaced instruments, and supplied the practical necessities that gave the music and the music-makers a chance to return.
A panel of representatives of these “musical first-responders” will discuss what has been learned in the decade since the flood, with interviews and footage featuring people who fought to save the music following Hurricane Katrina. The discussion will take place inside the Louisiana State Museum’s Old U.S. Mint.
While inside the air-conditioned museum, attendees also can visit the new, never-before-seen exhibit, Louis Armstrong—A Boy from New Orleans.
A collaboration between FQFI and the Louis Armstrong House Museum in Queens, New York, the exhibit includes rare artifacts such as Armstrong’s first cornet from the New Orleans Colored Waif’s Home side-by-side (for the first time ever) with the last Selmer trumpet he brought to his final visit to New Orleans in 1968.
Pages from Armstrong’s unpublished manuscripts will be included, in addition to rare audio from Armstrong’s private tapes. Numerous photographs will follow Armstrong from his upbringing to later return visits, such as his first heroic trip home in the summer of 1931 and the time in 1949 when Armstrong’s boyhood ambition of being named “King of the Zulus” was finally realized.
Armstrong’s difficult relationship with the city’s race relations will also be touched on, including the decades when Armstrong stayed away from New Orleans because his integrated band of All Stars was prohibited from performing in public in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
“By highlighting historic artifacts from so many historic collections, this exhibit will tell the story of Louis Armstrong’s relationship with New Orleans like it has never been told before,” Louis Armstrong House and Museum Archivist Ricky Riccardi said.
Seminars about Louis Armstrong and the history and influence of jazz in New Orleans will also take place inside the museum.
In 2015, presenters include Riccardi, Louis Armstrong House Museum Executive Director Michael Cogswell; famous jazz writer Dan Morgenstern; record producers Scott Wenzel and Scott Billington; singers Jewel Brown and Daryl Sherman; trombonist David Sager; author Mick Carlon; music historians David Kunian and Dr. Bruce Boyd Raeburn; OffBeat writer John Swenson; and clarinetist Evan Christopher.
Throughout the day on Saturday and Sunday, children and parents can relax on the second floor of the museum and enjoy “Pop’s Playhouse”, a dedicated children’s area with an array of educational, entertaining family activities, movies, and exhibits.
For more information on all FQFI festivals and events visit our website at www.fqfi.org or call 504-522-5730.
