Leo Nocentelli – home at last

18th April 2016   ·   0 Comments

By Geraldine Wyckoff
Contributing Writer

“I look forward to Jazz Fest and I don’t have to leave this time,” says guitar wizard Leo Nocentelli, who after 33 years of residing in Los Angeles moved back to his hometown six months ago. An original member of the highly-innovative band, The Meters, Nocentelli is also very excited about the group he’s bringing together for his Jazz Fest set on Saturday, April 23, and most particularly his teaming with keyboardist Bernie Worrell with whom he’s been touring.

“They will be getting two legends from basically the same era,” he exclaims of he and Worrell. “They’re going to get Leo Nocentelli of The Meters doing songs that he wrote for The Meters. Not only are they getting that, they are going to get Bernie Worrell the innovator and the writer of ‘Flashlight’ and all of all that George Clinton and P-Funk music. That’s what the show is going to be about – the joining of both musics. We’ll switch from ‘Fiyo on the Bayou’ to ‘If you hear any noise, it’s just me and the boys getting down…’ (“Mothership Connection). He’s one of the most innovated musicians who ever lived.”

The rest of the band ain’t shabby either and includes names like saxophonist Donald Harrison Jr., drummer Stanton Moore, bassist Bill “The Buddha” Dickens, percussionist/vocalist and Louisiana native Steven Perrilloux and vocalists Michael “Soulman” Baptiste, Elise Testone (from “American Idol”), Big Chief Alfred Doucette and Margie Perez.

The night before his Jazz Fest show, the guitarist will once again be reunited with The Meters that performs at the Orpheum Theatre on Friday, April 22. Much to their fans delight, of late the original members – Nocentelli, keyboardist/vocalist Art Neville, bassist/vocalist George Porter and drummer Zigaboo Modeliste – have been playing concerts after years of avoiding working under The Meters moniker and pursuing their own careers.

“It’s always good,” Nocentelli says performing with the group that is credited to being one of the originators of funk. “The music is always phenomenal. It’s our music. In terms of relationships in the band, there are some things there but it’s never to the point that we can’t play with one another. Everyone is an individual. Everybody has a different way of looking at life and business. The bottom line, the music with The Meters never suffered. When we get on the stage it’s a different game altogether. I think we’ve proven that over the years.”

On the Wednesday between the Jazz Fest weekends, April 27, Nocentelli will play with two different – though undoubtedly both funky – sets at the Fiya Fest that is held at Mardi Gras World. He’ll be featured with another funk innovator, the great drummer Bernard Purdie, who beyond his work as leader is renown for laying down the beat behind the Godfather of Soul James Brown. At the festival, which runs from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m., the guitarist will also be working with a group that includes organist/vocalist Ivan Neville. Generation to generation that how music evolves in New Orleans. For further information and the full schedule go to www.fiyawerx.com.

Nocentelli has always demonstrated a unique, very individual approach to playing guitar. He’s fast-fingered, funky and intense.

“I listen to a lot of music and a lot of other people but it always resorts back to the way I feel, the way I interpret thing,” he explains adding that early on he checked out jazz guitarist legends like Charlie Christian, Barney Kessel and Wes Montgomery. “I’m just Leo. The guitar itself inspired me – the object – and music. That’s what made me start writing like when I wrote “Cissy Strut.” I started writing music off the guitar.”

Nocentelli, who in 2001 was honored as a member of The Meters with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement award, has collaborated with a who’s who of musicians through his long career. While in Los Angeles, he was working on a recording of duets called The Project that includes luminaries singer/composer Peter Gabriel, keyboardists and vocalists George Duke, Harry Connick Jr. and Allen Toussaint, vocalist Kirk Whalum, Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews and guitarist/vocalist Taj Mahal. It’s complete and Nocentelli is in the process of shopping for a deal.

The guitarist practically bubbles when talking about how much it means to him to have returned to New Orleans.

“It’s overwhelming – I’m home,” he exclaims. “I would come back here every year to do the festival (Jazz Fest) and I’d stay two or three weeks and then I’d go back to L.A. The more I came down here, the more I didn’t want to leave.”

“I’ve been very happy,” he continues. “I have a new mindset. I’m thinking like I used to think – fresh things. My job could take me anywhere. The simplicity of New Orleans is what I missed. That’s what pulled me back here. In Los Angeles the corner grocery is like mile away. I’m glad for the experience (of having moved) because when I left New Orleans, I felt that there was a ceiling, that you could only go so far. I thought, ‘Let me go out there and see if I can get all I can get out of what I do.’

Just because Nocentelli is among us once again and, from the sound of it, in New Orleans to stay, don’t expect to see his name popping up at local clubs.

“I didn’t really come down here to gig,” he says. “I came down here with the mindset for really digging into the industry.”

During these next few weeks, however, there are more than ample opportunities to catch Leo Nocentelli, one of the innovators and originators of the funk movement that continues to rage today.

This article originally published in the April 18, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.