Billy Joel Plays George Rodrigue's Blue Dog Steinway During New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Fundraiser

Billy Joel stops into the George Rodrigue Foundation of the Arts (GRFA) to play the Rodrigue Steinway for the 2013 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Fundraiser Courtesy Musings of an Artist's Wife

Another inspiring post from Musings of an Artist's Wife - By Wendy Rodrigue, Wife of Artist George Rodrigue

This time of year is a wonderful time to be living in Cajun Country.  Not only is it Crawfish season, but for several weekends in a row we celebrate the amazing cultural heritage of our south Louisiana communities.

I'm particularly fond of the Festival International de Louisiane and the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, having spent a substantial chunk of my childhood in both Lafayette and New Orleans.  In Wendy Rodrigue's latest blog post, she shares some of the ways music, art, and storytelling intersect through George Rodrigue's own past.

... AND Billy Joel stops by to jam on George Rodrigue's Blue Dog Steinway piano!

Jazz Fest 2006

I was able to wrangle a day off of work to head down to New Orleans for the last weekend of the 2006 Jazz & Heritage Festival. Truth be told, I didn't manage to make it to the festival fairgrounds proper. I had a couple of friends in from D.C., along with some s, ightseeing to do.
Truth is, I've lived in New Orleans (while Mom was doing her masters work at Tulane) and I hadn't been back since Katrina hit. I left Louisiana to come back up to Austin the weekend before it struck, and I've kind of been intentionally avoiding returning for a visit.

So, I went down and had a blast. Of course, it was depressing to see the extent of the damage (even after all this time, until you've seen it with your own two eyes, it seems unreal), but all hope is not lost. I was able to visit with my brother and some friends, and we passed a good time, cher!

For all of you who revellers who were there with us in New Orleans, you can view the pics Samantha and I took from Dinner at my Flicker Site. Download and enjoy.

First, we went to dinner at an AMAZING restaurant - John Besh's latest, "August" The meal was amazing, and the atmosphere was divine. It was one of my best friends' (John Stubbs) birthday, and we celebrated together with his two brothers (Nathan and Drew) and a few other guests that had come down from DC. A couple of high notes - sitting next to us after his show at the Jazz Fest was Jimmy Buffett:


The picture's pretty dark, I know, but that's him. We were trying to be polite and not disturb Mr. Buffett by using our flashes while he was having dinner. That's John being non-chalant and trying to tell us that Jimmy Buffett was behind him. Heh.