Travel year in review: Springsteen show renews heart in New Orleans
Updated 12/21/2006 5:34 PM ET
By Jerry Shriver, USA TODAY
Best experience
"Brothers and sisters, don't you cry, there'll be better times by and by," implored Bruce Springsteen during the opening song of his performance at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in April.
But most of us 50,000-plus disciples who had gathered at the fairgrounds to hear him that afternoon couldn't help it. Tears of sorrow, anger, joy and release dripped freely onto soil that nine months earlier had been swamped beneath Katrina's aftermath. In those desperate days, few believed that America's greatest cultural festival would ever be staged again, let alone in its normal slot the following spring.
Yet during the opening weekend a near-record, ebullient crowd, drawn from across the country, flowed through the gates to embrace all of those devastated but resilient food vendors, musicians, craftsmen and behind-the-scenes workers who had returned. The initial sight of that outpouring set my wife to sniffling.
I held off until Springsteen's show, which closed the opening weekend. This was the public debut of Bruce's boisterous 17-piece ragtime/Dixieland/oompah/rockabilly band that he assembled to play spirituals, protest songs and feisty American ballads written or popularized by Pete Seeger.
From the opening piano and fiddle runs of Oh, Mary Don't You Weep to the hymn-like version of When the Saints Go Marching In 2½ hours later, the group created the most powerful musical performance I have seen in 35 years of attending concerts.
Every probing lyric and urgent arrangement seemed tailored to the region's and the country's plight. And when coupled with Springsteen's poignant spoken tributes to the city and his expressions of outrage and hope, the effect was pure catharsis. It's a sound I am still replaying in my heart.
READ MORE: Springsteen helps Big Easy overcome Food will be jazzing up New Orleans' spirit
No comments:
Post a Comment