I’ve been attending the Lafayette festival for the past four days and almost feel like a local. I’m spotting people that I’ve seen over the days. The festival has turned the downtown historic district into a walking arcade with four huge sound stages. Even though I had volunteered to be part of their 1,500 volunteer workforce, they never called me back up so I was free to roam. My main desire was to focus on local musicians and let the “international” part fall into place. There was one major treat that I happened on: the acknowledgment of a legend. The Lost Bayou Ramblers escorted to a chair on stage an ancient man in a cowboy hat and thus started a tribute to the Hackberry Ramblers. The legend, who was part of the band (I tried to catch his name, but couldn’t) started playing for dances after high school. The band was in high demand and soon became famous locally then nationally. The young members of the Lost Bayou Ramblers asked him to join them on his fiddle while they played one of the Hackberry Ramblers’ songs. A stage hand brought him his fiddle and away he went; the crowd went absolutely wild. After the song, the lead fiddler turned to the old man and then to the crowd saying, “Not bad for being 95!!!” The man spoke about starting on the fiddle at the age of 12, being taught by his dad and graduating in 1931. His band had a great singer but he couldn’t be heard in the dance halls. The man said he read about a new invention being used by orators called an amplifier so he checked it out. He bought one but there was no electricity where they played dances so he hooked the amp up to his car battery. He said that he would have to have his car running for four hours for a dance. His band was the first ever to play with electricity. And the Lost Bayou Ramblers themselves were outstanding especially the stand-up bass fiddle player. He was one with the monster and at one point balanced the instrument on edge, then climbed up on top of it and led the audience in clapping to the music! Again people were dancing up front, at the sides and in the back. The locals love their dance and it’s no “stand and face each other and shake it.” This is couple dancing; fine couple dancing. What an incredible one and a half hours.
Another group, Congre’s Mondial from New Brunswick, Canada, set me on fire both in listening to them and kindling the drive to experience their providence in August. There was a huge push from the band to connect with their Acadian Louisiana cousins that they were separated from 300 hundred years ago. As they gave the last names of the performers, cheers went up in the crowd. One of the most touching moments in their show was when they sang an endearing song about the deportation of the Acadian people in the mid-1700’s: two men standing near me were singing along with them. Afterwards I went to the New Brunswick booth at the festival, which gave me more ideas about my visit there.
Besides listening to the superb music of the festival I also people watched. This happening was certainly a local’s event. People everywhere were greeting one another with shouts and hugs. And children under foot at every turn. Lafayette is a vibrant community. However one element sadden me – smoking. I have not seen so much smoking by all ages and sexes.
I managed to sneak in a visit to another historic village across town from where I’m staying. I bought their “packaged deal” for $22. It included a National Park Service ranger lead hour-long boat tour on the Vermilion Bayou, a buffet lunch of gumbo, catfish and other local eats and then the tour of the village. The place was crawling with school kids so there were docents in period clothes stationed throughout the village to talk to them. The doors were all open to the old houses and structures that had been moved to make the "village" however one house had the door closed and I as I pushed it open I realized that it was air conditioned. And there sitting by himself with no one around was a middle-aged black man with a fiddle. He asked me a couple of questions then started talking about the music of the Cajun/Creole people. I stood transfixed for 45 minutes as he talked and played. He would play something that a Cajun band would play and then how a Zydeco band would play it. He talked about the racial mixed bands playing at "white" and "black" dances and the history of both. He spoke of how a man, just a farmer, would pick up the fiddle and dazzle the dance crowd. His one comment that made me burst out laughing was that "this was not contra dance band music!" Just before I left a couple came in and he acknowledged them by asking a question, then started talking to them in Creole French!!!
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