January 7, 2011
On Thursday, I boarded a plane for New Orleans along with the New Trier Jazz Ensemble and Jazz Choir, about 40 students and six chaperones. The groups were invited to perform at a jazz educators convention that is called (get ready for it) JEN, which stands for Jazz Educators Network. So do you know what that means?
I’m at JenCon!!!!!!
While there’s not a lot of role playing going on, there are certainly a few costumes here in NOLA and some of the musicians are certainly wizards (or at least bards). This is only the second annual JEN convention. The organization replaces the previous one that was called the National Association of Jazz Educators, which I actually attended back in 1983 in Columbus, Ohio when I was a member of the fabulous Elk Grove High School “New Horizons”. It’s quite possible that Gerry Evenwel and I played D&D on that trip because we roomed together. I vividly remember us setting up all the audio equipment in the room and me hooking up with a soprano(but that’s a story for another day). That’s right: Gerry and I were in the jazz choir together, and DO NOT call it a show choir. While there were moments when it bordered on “Glee”, this was vocal jazz. NO DANCING ALLOWED!!!
On this trip, the kids from New Trier are pretty remarkable musicians. Upon arriving here we headed for a charter school working with some music organization in the city to play a show for some little kids. It was a good warm up for the main show at the convention, which occurred on Friday. New Trier was the only high school group invited to play on the main stage. They did a great job and were joined by Terrell Stafford for “Caravan”, one of my favorite songs. There were lots of other school and professional groups to see and some of the seminars looked good even to me! On Saturday, we’re doing a large bus tour to see all the damage from Katrina and to visit the Musician’s Village, where New Trier students helped build a house with Habitat for Humanity back in 2009.
I’m really just here for moral support and to help pay for part of the trip. But it was a great excuse to visit New Orleans again. The French Quarter was not really affected by the flooding since it is the high point. However, most of the businesses disappeared and are just now starting to thrive again. I’d say it is about 80% of what it was in 2005, which is the last time I was here. This afternoon it was 65 degrees and sunny so I just had to get out and walk around, checking out some art stores, listening to the street musicians, and then found this great outdoor café to sit down and have some café au lait and beignets. So good!
