Best of the Beat – Honoring Our Own
18th January 2017 · 0 Comments
By Geraldine Wykcoff
Contributing Writer
The Best of the Beat Awards presented by OffBeat magazine celebrants its 22nd anniversary on Thursday, January 19, 2017. Held at Generations Hall, 310 Andrew Higgins Drive, the party offers free food and lots of music. The four-room venue makes a perfect setting for chatting with the many musicians, music industry people, journalists and avid fans of New Orleans music in attendance plus dancing and checking out the bands including old favorites and up-and-comers.
The highlight of the evening is always the tribute to the artist who has earned the Lifetime Achievement Award. As has been previously announced, this year that honor goes to the very deserving drummer Johnny Vidacovich. Since his teenage years, the New Orleans native has been enriching not only this city’s jazz scene but its music scene overall with his intuitive playing and musical approach to the drum set. Vidacovich, 67, remains best known as a member of the all-star group Astral Project, the recently formed NOLAtet as well as for his Thursday night residency at the Maple Leaf. He played behind strippers at Bourbon Street bars when he was just 16, performed with masters like pianist Mose Allison, funked it up with bassist George Porter and laid down the rhythms for pianists/vocalists James Booker and Professor Longhair.
“If you just make rock ‘n roll a little sloppier, it’s funk,” Vidacovich has declared. “There ain’t no difference. It’s syncopated rock ‘n roll, that’s all it is.”
Just a great tidbit from Johnny… As a kid, he’d sit on the floor surrounded by pots, pans and lids – his make-shift drums and cymbals. Ingeniously, his grandmother cut off the tip of a flyswatter to provide him with his first “brush.” “They would wiggle a little bit,” he remembered.
The Vidacovich tribute band at the Best of the Beat party is a killer and made up of both the drummer’s contemporaries and his former, very successful students. Stanton Moore, who studied with Vidacovich and these days hits the drums with the jam/funk blasters Galactic and swings some jazz with the Stanton Moore Trio, put the group together. It includes saxophonist Tony Dagradi and bassist James Singleton of Astral Project, master pianist David Torkanowky, a former member of Astral Project who’s at the keyboards at some of this city’s best gigs, and, as a very special treat, drummer Brian Blade.
In 1998, Blade, 46, specifically came down from his hometown of Shreveport to study with Vidacovich at Loyola University. “Hearing him for the first time was a revelation,” Blade has remembered. “I wanted to be around these inventors, these sound makers and Johnny was at the heart of that.” Blade’s career soon exploded. He’s been a member of the legendary saxophonist Wayne Shorter’s quartet since 2000 and leads his own highly-regarded ensemble, the Fellowship Band. The drummer will also be back in town next month to perform with guitarist Davy Mooney’s band. Also in February, Blade and his Fellowship will also team with the Loyola University Symphony Orchestra.
The winners of the majority of the awards like those for the artist and album of the year, best emerging artist, best blues, jazz, zydeco performers and the like, which are determined by votes from the public, will be announced at Thursday night’s bash. However, the music business and special awards were given out last week at a function held at the beautiful Orpheum Theater. They included two Heart Beat awards that this year where presented by the Positive Vibrations organization in collaboration with OffBeat magazine.
The two honorees – guitarist/banjoist Detroit Brooks and Darryl “Dancing Man 504” Young – are familiar faces to anyone who enjoys the New Orleans music scene. Beyond playing great music, Brooks is also the producer of the Danny Barker Guitar & Banjo Festival that in January celebrated its third year. It’s a labor of love for Brooks to ensure that Barker’s significant contributions to New Orleans as a musician and mentor of youths are remembered.
Outside in front the Orpheum, Dancing Man, who created the youth-oriented program Heal2Toe program and BrassXcise regimen to “get people moving,” declared his award was for “everybody.” Always strutting and smiling, he planned to head down to Frenchmen Street to share the award with the New Breed Brass Band that was honored by OffBeat last year as the Best Emerging Band.
Others who were recognized that night included Sonny Schneidau who kept the music real as talent booker for Tipitina’s and then the House of Blues. Applause rang out as he was given the Lifetime Achievement Award in Business. In a twist, Schneidau will be playing guitar with the Fortifiers band at the Best of the Beat party.
Talking with Dr. Bruce Boyd Raeburn of Tulane’s Hogan Jazz Archives is always a learning experience. Call or go there and he’ll have or find the answers to your questions about the music. Raeburn was thus honored with the Lifetime Achievement in Music Education.
Further information on the Best of the Beat awards party can be found at www.offbeat.com. Word to the wise: It starts at 6 pm and the food is free so get there early.
Sullivan Fortner – NOCCA Homecoming
Pianist Sullivan Fortner stands as yet another of New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts’ (NOCCA) talented graduates who have gone on to take his place on the national and international jazz scene. Fortner, who presently works with trumpet ace Roy Hargrove and has performed with class acts like vibraphonist Stefon Harris and our own trumpeter Christian Scott, returns the favor to play at his alma mater on Friday, January 20, 2017. He’ll lead the Sullivan Fortner Trio with two other New Orleans natives, bassist Jasen Weaver and drummer Miles Labat. In 2015, Fortner made his recording debut as leader releasing his fine album, Aria, on the high-respected Impulse! label. Showtime at NOCCA is 8 p.m.
This article originally published in the January 16, 2017 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
