New Orleans Road Trip

Ok, so my pal Ricky Rees and I ran off to New Orleans and sat in with
The Panorama Jazz Band for thier regular Saturday night stand on
Bourbon Street. It was a last minute deal as thier regular banjo
player and tuba player are out of town. Long way to go for a gig,
sure, but hey man, it's New Orleans and nobody's getting any younger.

On the way out we stopped in on Brian Marshall in Tomball. Unbeknownst
to us, he had put ribs in the smoker and kielbasa in the pan. By the
time we got to his place, he laid out a massive old school Texas
Polish spread of beef and pork ribs, Bremond sausage, home grown
tomatoes and homemade Krupnik (don't ask.)

7 hours later, We pulled into the Seaport Cafe in time to eat again
and get ready for a 4 hour gig of great jazz, begine and klezmer
music. As we wrapped up a lovely night, a thought occured to me that I
wish to share with my brother musicians, especially those who are
playing jazz music.

Why bother trying to convince people to listen to your music, when you
can go someplace that has a built in expectation of it? Personally,
I've had no luck at all getting anybody interested in Jewish music
down here in Texas, but folks seem to really enjoy my Texas swing
band, imagine that. If I wanted to play Jewish music all the time,
maybe I should go where Jews actually like to hear their own music,
which I'm here to tell you from a decade of experience is not Austin
TX. Thousands of people travel to New Orleans every day in the
expectation of hearing great New Orleans Jazz music. Sounds like just
the place to place New Orleans Jazz don't you think?

Just a thought. Could have just been the Krupnik talking...

Hannukah in July

Wow. They keep everything up forever on the web it seems.

Here's a 2002 clip from Warner Channel News 8 Austin with Cantor Nei Blumofe.

Enjoy!

The Best Hotel I Ever Stayed At

It's called the Eden, located in the Kazimerz district of Cracow Poland.

The ex-pat owner made me and the other musicians staying there just as comfortable as I've ever been anywhere. It was almost off putting how nice they were. I got over it quick however.

They had something called a "salt grotto" in the basement of the hotel. It's a small room filled with 6 tons of salt, as if you found yourself deep in a salt mine. There's gently running water in the corner, mood lighting behing the walls of salt (nice touch) and comfy chairs to lounge in. A nice waitress brings you a Tatanka, a favorite summer drink made of one part apple juice and one part Zubrowska (Buffalo Grass) vodka, and you just chill. I found myself in there just about every night I was in Crackow, winding down with fellow performers.

Here's the website, with an interesting legend about the building where the Eden now stands.