Leaving Ordinary Time Tuesday, Feb 21 2012

Today is Mardi Gras. The end of Carnival. The end of Ordinary Time. Ordinary Time?

The Roman Catholic Church recognizes two stretches of Ordinary Time during their liturgical calendar. The first runs from the end of the Christmas Season, Epiphany (January 6th) up to Ash Wednesday, the start of the Lenten Season. The second is longer and less eventful, running from the end of Pentecost (the end of Eastertide) up to the Saturday before the beginning of Advent, the four-week period leading up to Christmas and the beginning of the liturgical year. In the grand scheme of things, the first is definitely more interesting than the second.

The first span of Ordinary Time, especially in places that celebrate Carnival or Mardi Gras, is anything but Ordinary. The time is filled with masked balls, King Cake parties, and eventually the festivities, feasting and parades leading up to Mardi Gras/Fat Tuesday/Shrove Tuesday/Pancake Day. Take your pick depending upon your local tradition.

In New Orleans, Ordinary Time ends exactly at midnight on Mardi Gras. It is so important that the police clear Bourbon Street, arresting those who persist in carrying their partying over into the early hours of Ash Wednesday. Nothing is left to chance or inebriated, self control. It. Is. Over.

Italian-American Marching Club Parade, Bourbon St., March 2007.

The curtain closes.  In a season which recognized Christ’s 40 days in the desert, those seeking the fasting, prayer and penance of the Lenten season go to church to receive Palm Sunday’s recycled palm fronds in the form of ashes. A new season. A new holy season has begun.

But there are loopholes. While in past centuries believers gave up meat, eggs and dairy, during Lent, today’s Catholics must only give up meat on the Fridays. But these restriction, too, may be waived if St. Patrick’s Day (March 17th), St. Joseph’s Day (March 19th), or the Annunciation (March 25th) chance to fall on a Friday. Then, dioceses may choose to wave the Fast. And that is important in New Orleans, where St. Patrick’s Day and St. Joseph’s Day are important for Irish and Italian/African-American residents, respectively. In a span of a few days, St. Patrick’s parades, St. Joseph’s parades and altars, and Mardi Gras Indian processions will come and come. And while the religious connections may be tenuous, they are extremely important in their respective communities.

Uptown Indian Parade, March 20, 2011.

So, while the NOPD might clear the Quarter at midnight following Mardi Gras, the parades, the parties, and the beads continue, albeit at a slower pace.

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Mardi Gras Miscellany Wednesday, Feb 15 2012

OK, I’ll be arriving in New Orleans three weeks, one day and 21 hours from now, not that anyone is counting. In the meantime, there is a lot going on in the Crescent City. A few days after the Grammy Awards, a few days before Mardi Gras; well, things are popping and in a blaze of randomness, I’ll try to capture it, in keeping with the season, without adding any unnecessary structure.

• Rebirth Brass Band returns from the Grammy Awards — After nearly thirty years of producing great music, Rebirth scored their first Grammy for best regional roots album. Kermit Ruffins, one of the band’s founders, the Baby Boyz Brass Band, and other friends and musicians, greeted the band as they arrived at the Louis Armstrong International Airport. Here’s the video.
  

  Rebirth Brass Band receiving the Grammy Award.

• King Cake Crown awarded — for the last few weeks, Judy Walker, food editor for the Times-Picayune has led a team of king cake tasters throughout the New Orleans region to find the finest Carnival-season confection. The judges visited six bakeries that were picked from over 20,000 reader votes. nola.com provided videos from visits to the six bakeries, including: Gambino’s; Haydel’s; Manny Randazzo’s; Nonna Randazzo’s; Randazzo’s Camellia City; and Sucre. All bakeries put forward three King Cakes except for Sucre, which makes only one. The six top cakes were pitted against one another and the top three were separated by but 1.5 points. The winner, announced today was Manny Randazzo’s pecan praline king cake. A celebration ensued at the bakery.
• New Galactic album — Galactic, the great New Orleans funk/rock band has a new album, Carnivale Electricos, coming out on Mardi Gras Day. Since the whole concept is a reworking of classic Mardi Gras tunes, it seems cruel to make us wait until the season is over. I have heard snippets, but not the whole album. Thankfully, Conan O’Brien and Team Coco are providing a full album stream for the album. For a listen, go here.
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  New Orleans City Councilwoman Dorothy Mae Taylor, 1992

  An Integrated Mardi Gras — And to all of this frivolity, let’s add a bit of history. Twenty years ago, City Councilor Dorothy Mae Taylor had the audacity to force old-time Mardi Krewes to abandon the racism and sexism that they represented. And while jail time was dropped as part of the ordinance, the new regulations  forced old-time krewes Comus and Momus off the streets. Rex and Proteus agreed to the new regulations and continue to parade. According to columnist James Gill, Taylor should receive credit for making Mardi Gras krewes more color-blind and the season as a whole, an all embracing celebration. It is good not to forget such achievements.

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King Cake: “Yeah, there’s an app for that!” Friday, Dec 30 2011

The tradition of serving King Cake as part of the New Orleans carnival season dates back to the 18^th Century. The baked confection, which contains a trinket (often a plastic baby) or dried bean, has been decorated with purple, green, and gold sugar or icing since those colors became a part of Mardi Gras in the 19th Century. It is proper fare anytime from Epiphany (January 6th) through Mardi Gras. And you’d think the tradition could just rest with that, but you would be wrong.

King Cake from Haydel's, Super Bowl Sunday, February 2010.

For years, former New Orleans residents could have a King Cake shipped anywhere from a number of New Orleans area bakeries. The packages usually contain the cake, Mardi Gras beads and trinkets, and perhaps even a music cd. Most of those bakeries have websites where you can order your little piece of Carnival and increasingly, you can find Haydel’s,   various Randazzo bakeries, and others on Facebook.

Randazzo’s Camellia City Bakery has taken taken the King Cake tradition and social media to the next level. This year the bakery has launched an interactive King Cake app — King Me! So, if you feel the need to order a customized King Cake using your smartphone or tablet, you’re in business!

Yes, a new tradition for Carnival!

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On the Twelfth Day of Christmas…and Beyond Thursday, Jan 6 2011

King Cake, Super Bowl Party, 2010

For most Americans, the Christmas tree was banished to the curb over a week ago; and in many stores, Valentines and boxes of chocolates have replaced tinsel and candy canes. Nevertheless, in much of Christendom, today, January 6^th, marks the end of festivities. And to think of it, the symbolism of the Epiphany – the presentation of the newborn baby to the Magi – has more gift-giving relevance than a bunch of sheep surrounding a manger. Regardless, for most of us, the holiday season has quietly come to a close.

Except, that is, in places like New Orleans. For them, January 6^th marks the close of the Christmas season, but simultaneously the beginning of the Carnival season. From the first “King Cake” on the Twelfth Night (see “An Epiphany”), Carnival builds from parties and balls into the crescendo of beads, floats, and beer that is Mardi Gras. And this year, with Mardi Gras falling on March 8^th, the pre-Lenten celebration is longer than usual.

This is not to say that the next two months will be filled with drunkenness and debauchery. Just as people who remain on Bourbon Street are under the mistaken impression that they have experienced New Orleans, Carnival is much more textured, traditional, and family-oriented than the national media or “Girls Gone Wild” videos suggest.

Beads along St. Charles Ave., March 2008

Sure, folks in southern Louisiana seldom run from good fun, but the lion’s share of the balls, cotillions, parties, and other activities take place in neighborhoods and suburbs not called the French Quarter. Most parades pass along broad avenues where families set out lawn chairs and barbeques on the grassy medians (called “neutral ground”) so that they can make a day of it. Tourists generally miss the formal balls, the Mardi Gras Indians, and earlier parades, and likewise, miss the point.

The Carnival celebration is the product of the city’s traditions — religious, social, and ethnic. And if you know the people, you also know that such traditions are guarded with a certain ferocity.  To suggest to them that drunken lunkheads or the baring of breasts is part of Mardi Gras tradition, would be like praising FEMA or inviting BP to a beach party. Public ritual, borne of generations, is tradition; bad behavior is not.

So when you see the national news coverage of the festivities, rest assured that there is a lot more going on than meets the eye.

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New Orleans Seventy Years Ago: In Living Color Saturday, Nov 13 2010

In the last couple of days I’ve come across a couple of fascinating short films about New Orleans. They were produced a few months apart in 1940 and 1941 and both are in color.

The first is a short documentary that James A. Fitzpatrick made for MGM. The beginning is missing, but the rest of it seems to be intact. It was made as part of the “Travel Talk” series, but comes off more as a social studies lesson. A lot of focus on the the Mississippi and shipping. Great scenes of Cafe du Monde,  the Roosevelt Hotel, and the “new” Charity Hospital. The shots of bustling Canal Street, when compared to the present, are rather sad. Not surprisingly, after viewing the short, you wouldn’t know that New Orleans including Bourbon Street or working class neighborhoods. You can view it on YouTube.

The other was made a few months later during the Mardi Gras celebration in late February 1941. The film quality and color are quite remarkable. There is no sound, but music featuring George Lewis and Johnny Dodds provides appropriate musical accompaniment. It includes a children’s krewe and the first female krewe (Venus). Alas, it would be the last Mardi Gras celebration until after World War II. You can view it here.

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Who Dat? Nobody! Redemption, at last. Monday, Feb 8 2010

I don’t think there has ever been an American city that could have as much going on as once as New Orleans. And this is a city that thrives on special occasions.

OK, first of all, this is the first big weekend of Mardi Gras parades and celebrations. Then there is this election to choose a successor to Ray Nagin. So, let’s throw in a little thing called the Super Bowl  for the neer-do-well local team — just to make it interesting.

So, Monday has dawned. New Orleans has a new mayor. Multiple opponents. No run-off, First white mayor in 32 years, but one who received a majority of the African-American votes against a black opponent. It helps that the new mayor, Mitch Landrieu, is the well-connected son of the last white New Orleans Mayor, “Moon” Landrieu.

Then there’s this little thing called Mardi Gras. Parade times, along with mass schedules had to be rearranged to accommodate the Super Bowl. What a pain. The normal parades took place, although crowds were a little thinner than usual. Sunday parades included one of my favorite, the Krewe of Barkus parade, themed: “The Dogs Go Barking In.”

BUT, and I must repeat, BUT, the Super Bowl and the Saint’s definitive victory is the exclamation point on the weekend, if not, in fact, that of an entire decade. It’s as if the remaining water left from Katrina has been drained from the streets of New Orleans. The city is back. The people are looking forward. The sadness is over. If the Saints can overcome four decades of football futility, the city can overcome four decades of decline.

This is a time for the city to celebrate. But what this may represent, is a far more significant reason for New Orleans to celebrate. It is back! Big time.

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Who Dat Say They Gonna Replace Ray Nagin? Saturday, Feb 6 2010

Some things are normal in New Orleans. Krewe members are gathering bags of throws to distribute at Mardi Gras Parades. Dog owners are preparing costumes for their pets so they can march in Sunday’s Krewe of Barkus parade in the French Quarter. But wait, the Mardi Gras parade schedule has to be rearranged. Churches are altering mass schedules. And school on Monday; don’t count out on it. So Mardi Gras, mass, and school all take a back seat when the Saints are playing in their first Super Bowl.

But something else of importance is happening this weekend. Today, New Orleans is holding an election to see who replaced Ray Nagin as mayor. Eight years ago, businessman Ray Nagin was swept into office because he was not a career politician. He would bring business sensibilities to city government and had no history of personal entanglements that would lead to corruption. History may or may not disprove these assumptions.

So, all eyes are not on this race. There’s a lot at stake, but the election is far from being on the front burner. Early voting has been strong, but that could be because voters want to clear their weekend to follow the festivities. So what’s at stake?

Much rebuilding needs to be done, and electing someone with political connections appears important to most. And race, whether from post-Katrina demographics or Ray Nagin-fatigue, doesn’t appear that important. The most promising African-American candidate withdrew, leaving Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu as the odds-on-favorite to follow Nagin. In fact a low turnout could make him outright winner without the usual runoff election.

The result: the first white mayor of New Orleans in 32 years. But a pedigree that makes him a politically-connected him one. His sister, Mary, is the senior U.S. Senator from Louisiana. And his father, Maurice “Moon” Landrieu, was the last white mayor of New Orleans. In fact, one of my favorite spaces in the city is the green space along the river know as the “Moon” Walk in his honor.

So, while krewes march through the streets. And the Colts and the Saints prepare for battle. New Orleans will also be electing a mayor. And while neither as colorful as parades, nor as exciting as the Super Bowl, the election will have significant impact on the future of New Orleans. For more on the election, click some fine analysis from the New York Times here.

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Unconventional Times for an Unconventional City Saturday, Jan 30 2010

“Stop thinking of New Orleans as the worst-organized city in the United States. Start thinking of it as the best-organized city in the Caribbean. New Orleans is a city-sized act of civil disobedience.” Dan Baum

Weird times for New Orleans.

For over 290 years, New Orleans has accepted life behind the eight ball. Spring floods, yellow fever epidemics, ethnic strife, hurricanes, and pervasive corruption. Even before Hurricane Katrina, the city was a mess. Just this week, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said that Katrina was the best thing that ever happened to education in New Orleans.

Honestly, New Orleans still has serious problems: crime, corruption, education, health care, and the realization that the next big storm could cripple the city for decades. And while residents remain aware of their collective frailties, they are drawn to the good things that are taking place in the city. And much of this energy is focused on the annual carnival celebration and the singular success of their perennial NFL near-do-wells, the Saints.

The Saints entered the league in 1967, on the heels of Hurricane Betsy, and although they have fielded numerous stars, from field goal Kicker Tom Dempsey, to quarterback Archie Manning, to running back Deuce McAllister, they are a stranger to the playoffs and have never appeared in the Super Bowl. Until now.The Super Bowl will affect Mardi Gras parades, Catholic mass schedules, and, quite possibly,  public school on the Monday following the big game.

On the Saturday before the Super Bowl, citizens will go to the polls to elect a successor to Ray Nagin. Many fear that the mania will depress voter turnout, which will likely benefit Mitch Landrieu, son of former mayor “Moon” Landrieu and brother of U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu. And while the results are of intense importance to the city’s future, more immediate interests cloud the peoples’ minds.

So, even though New Orleans’s values have never been aligned with “American” values, this level of disconnect is extraordinary. But I think it can be explained. New Orleans, regardless of its problems, is the epitome of resilience. It went from hard-scrabble colonial settlement to become the richest city in America. And within a few decades, it was among America’s poorest cities. Through it all, the residents surround themselves with tradition, history, and a joie de vivre  that is fed by local food, music, and culture. It’s easy to come back if you’ve never, truly been anywhere else.

The entire region is gearing up for the Super Bowl. If they win, it will be the biggest municipal party in the history of the United States. However, if they lose, they’ll look to their new mayor, to the last nine days of Mardi Gras. They will eat well, party hard, sing, dance, and make the most of their days before the beginning of Lent. And they’ll be fine, thank you. And they will do this, because that is what they’ve always done; overcome the most awful adversities and move on.

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New Orleans Happenings Thursday, Feb 5 2009

OK, so it’s in the single digits here this morning, so I have to think of warmer climes. Oops, the strawberries and citrus in Florida are threatened by a freeze and New Orleans is in the 30s.

However, there are a number of interesting stories about New Orleans of late:

Zatarain’s, the New Orleans-area food producer, is petitioning to have Mardi Gras made a national holiday. Read (and sign) here: http://blog.nola.com/cest-la-nola/2009/02/zatarains_spearheading_petitio.html

An observant blogger (not me) discovered that if you search for “New Orleans” in Google, you can come up with a timeline of New Orleans history, with links from specific dates to open source content, a veritable “New Orleans History 2.0″ (to use her words). For the blog and link to the timeline see:  http://blog.nola.com/cest-la-nola/2009/02/history_of_new_orleans_20.html

The NOPD is at it again. An autopsy shows that a man killed by police on New Year’s Day was shot in the back of the body nine times:  http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/02/man_shot_by_police_hit_nine_ti.html

And in spite of such news, Mayor Nagin and the city council have reinstituted “Disney-like” sanitation services for the French Quarter.  It’s good to see where their priorities are. Which raises some interesting questions: do tourists vote? Does the rest of the city get dumpsters? See:  http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/02/deluxe_quarter_cleanup_resumes.html

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Happy New Year! Wednesday, Jan 7 2009

A new year has begun. And while it snows and sleets here in New Hampshire, the Carnival season is underway in Louisiana. Yesterday was Epiphany, the feast that marks the visitation of the Magi. While to most this marks the end of the Christmas season, in New Orleans it is the beginning of Carnival; it will stretch from now until Mardi Gras, which this year falls on February 24th.  In these winter weeks before the solemn season of Lent, revelers will attend masked balls, king cake parties, and parades throughout southern Louisiana. While we focus on the days leading up to Mardi Gras itself, this marks an entire season of celebration.

Although masked balls and parades are scarce here in the Granite State, Basin Street Records, in collaboration with NOLA.com (Times-Picayune online) has created NOLA Radio online, which will feature music from Kermit Ruffins, Henry Butler, Dr. Michael White and others to help mark the season. You can access it from here.

So don’t despair; even though you might have to forgo the king cake and beads, you can savor the music.

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