On December 31, 1912, in New Orleans, an 11-year-old boy took his stepfather’s gun without permission, and in all the excitement of New Year’s Eve, he fired six blanks into the air. This impulsive action likely changed the course of music forever. Read more

If you play clarinet, the one song you have to master is ‘High Society,’ because there’s a solo that proves you can call yourself a clarinet player in the New Orleans style. Read more

Mahalia Jackson was born in New Orleans, and grew up singing in church, at the Mt. Moriah Baptist Church in the Black Pearl neighborhood uptown. As a teenager she left the city, but her remarkable voice will be forever woven into its music and history. Read more

Through their own recordings and then on other people’s albums, The Meters' danceable New Orleans sound helped launch and define the funk genre in the early 1970s. And New Orleans music was never the same again. Read more

It was a hot day in September 1964 when the Beatles took to the stage in City Park-- and screaming fans from around the Gulf area greeted them. But the Beatles themselves were more excited to meet one of their heroes: Fats Domino. Read more

Louis Armstrong may have never become a household name if not for the ambitions of his second wife, Lil Hardin Armstrong-- a supremely talented musician in her own right. She was a member of the Hot Five and Hot Seven, and composed a number of their biggest hits. Read more

In the 1990s, somebody decided it was time to do something about the health issues plaguing New Orleans musicians and culture bearers. On May 1, 1998, the doors opened for the unparalleled New Orleans Musicians Clinic. Read more

All For One Records (AFO) was a collective label, completely owned by New Orleanian African-American musicians, including Harold Battiste, Chuck Badie, Alvin Red Tyler, Melvin Lastie, and more. They set up shop at the corner of Claiborne and Orleans Avenues in 1961. Read more

Clifton Chenier recorded over two dozen zydeco albums, toured the world, performed at nearly every Jazz Fest in New Orleans, won Grammys, and more. All because he took a chance and decided to get in that rickety old car with his band in 1954. Read more

George Wein, Quint Davis, and Allison Miner had a vision for the first Heritage Fair, of a festival that was uniquely New Orleanian, a place where the best of New Orleans culture was gathered together in a way everyone could experience. Read more