Second Line Culture In New Orleans

16th Anniversary Hurricane Katrina Memorial Second Line

The annual Hurricane Katrina march will begin at the corner of Jourdan Avenue and Galvez Street in the Lower 9th Ward on Sunday August 29th at noon.

The event is an annual commemoration of the lives tragically lost in the federal flood of 2005.

If we are fortunate Big Chief Victor Harris will give one of his signature speeches.

Following a 30 minute ceremony the group will process across the Industrial Canal where a brass band will join in for a second line that will conclude at Hunter’s Field at the corner of Claiborne Avenue and St Bernard [1659 N. Claiborne, New Orleans, LA 70116]

At the conclusion of the second line a host of local bands will perform at Hunter’s Field. There will be vendors selling all manners of food and drink.

What begins as a sombre morning at the site of a great tragedy ends in a raucous party in a park with hundreds of people dancing and drinking.

This is how New Orleanians both mourn and celebrate.

Website for the event

Second Line Culture In New Orleans

Action Jackson Second Line At Treme Hideaway

Action Jackson Second Line At Treme Hideaway

You know you were an important man in New Orleans when you get more than one funerary second line. Tonight, August 12th, 2021, DJ Action Jackson of WWOZ-fame will be celebrated at Treme Hideaway (1234 N Claiborne Ave, New Orleans, LA 70116) with a pop-up second line.

We previously feted Mr Jackson two days ago in the Lower 9th Ward.

Start time is 7pm and Big 6 Brass Band will provide the music.

RIP Charles “Action” Jackson

Second Line Culture In New Orleans

Congo Square Second Line with Stooges Brass Band

Congo Square Second Line Sunday August 8th 2021

Congo Square Preservation Society Drum Circle and master percussionist Luther Gray will issue a call to the ancestors on Sunday August 8th, 2021 at 1pm.

The call to the ancestors is one of the most spiritually intense sounds you will ever experience.

Following the call, a host of bands will perform including Delfeayo Marsalis and the Uptown Jazz Orchestra, Delfeayo’s mid-sized “big band” that plays songs from the 20s to the here and now.

To close out the affair Stooges Brass Band will lead a second line in the park.

Party grinds to a halt at 7pm.

Second Line Culture In New Orleans

Second Lines Are Back!

Second Lines are back!

Friday May 28th, 2021, marks the first day since the pandemic began that Second Lines will be able to legally roll across New Orleans.

We are stunned.

Watch this space for updates regarding which of the Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs can react fast enough to salvage this calendar season. Historically this weekend would’ve featured Money Wasters Social Aid and Pleasure Club.

Second Line Culture In New Orleans

$15 Second Lines At The Broadside Sponsored By Winn Dixie

$15 Second Lines at the Broadside

What a joke.

Social Aid and Pleasure Club Second Lines have been rolling in New Orleans for more than a century. On Sunday afternoons the brass kicks off a roving street party that lasts for hours and covers miles of the most beautiful city in North America.

Mayor Latoya Cantrell banned these outdoor parties 13 months ago.

Now in a remarkable display of modernity and capitalism they are being brought back by Winn Dixie et al! For $15 per person. Oh, and those Second Line vendors that have toiled to feed their families and keep a roof over their loved ones heads for decades? Well, “no outside food and drink” says it all.

Nature hates a vacuum and there was a giant rift in New Orleans when Latoya Cantrell banned Second Lines. Now the hole has been ably filled by merchants who saw an opening.

If you want to watch a “Second Line” in a tiny asphalt parking lot in Mid-City the poster has all the details.

Meanwhile tens of thousands of people crowd onto Bourbon Street seven nights a week while real Second Lines are banned.

This is modern New Orleans under the watch of a mayor born and raised in California.