NolaFunk Lagniappe

Widow of R&B pioneer Ernie K-Doe directs the rebirth of legendary lounge in New Orleans

“People said, `Did you bring Ernie?’” Antoinette said. “I said, `No, I left him. They’re rescuing live bodies, not statues.’” Ernie still gets around—his statue, that is. He has been to football games and parties at his tomb every All Saints Day. Friend John Blanchard takes him along when he sings at weddings and bachelor parties, propping the statue up when he performs the Allen Toussaint-penned “Mother-In-Law.”

The New Orleans Mardi Gras Indian Council has announced the schedule for Super Sunday.


Festivities begin at 11 a.m. Sunday, March 16, at Taylor Park (Washington Ave. and S. Derbigny St.). The parade begins at 1 p.m. and proceeds onto Simon Bolivar, Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and S. Galvez Avenue and circles back to the park. During the day, entertainment will be provided by the Hot 8 Brass Band, Big Al Carson, Stooges Brass Band and others. Mardi Gras Indians being honored this year are Big Chief “Lil” Charles Taylor of the White Cloud Hunters and Queen Barbara Wallace Sparks.






"Yet another tradition and celebration unique to our culture approaches"

"If you can’t come out to join in the festivities, then you can still be part of it since WWOZ will be video streaming live for the next few Sunday nights from the Handa Wanda Club for their weekly Mardi Gras Indian practice. Just because Mardi Gras is over doesn’t mean that the practices end. The suits have been sewn and displayed to the neighborhood people on Mardi Gras Day but now it is time to show off their hard work to the whole city and decide even informally, “who is the prettiest in 2008?”
The Mardi Gras Indians have often been the target of police harassment so often that ACLU legal observers have become part of the Super Sunday tradition. If you'd be interested in participating, HERE's some information about how you can help this Sunday, Super Sunday, March 16th.

Read more about Super Sunday HERE or read
"Indian Super Sunday - Hey! Hey! Hey Pocky-Way!
The Mardi Gras Indians Mask On St. Joseph’s Day"or
"For This Super Sunday, It's All About Mardi Gras Revelry"

"Mardi Gras Indian Chiefs Stand Spectacular, Tall, and Proud"





Various Artists: City of Dreams


"This collection spreads piano, blues, street beats, and slippery funk over four discs that are as joyous and imperfect as the Crescent City itself."

Huffington Post's "New Orleans: The Human Parts of the Equation" by OK Go's Damian Kulash

"What's at stake is more than the staggering sum of individual tragedies, it's a whole culture. We are in danger of losing one of America's last truly unique, bizarre, and wonderful engines of food, music, writing, people, and ideas."

"New Orleans is one of the last places in America where music is truly a fundamental part of everyday life," says OK Go singer Damian Kulash. "People get together on the weekends and parade through the streets just playing songs; 12-year-old-kids learn funk on the tuba; everyone dances. Life elsewhere in the world simply isn't as celebratory. If we allow the culture of New Orleans to die by leaving its musicians marooned around the country, America will have lost one of its great treasures."