Editorial Review:

Album Description:
Nonesuch Records is releasing a benefit album of newly recorded songs featuring artists from the New Orleans music community – across a wide variety of styles – to document the depth, richness and profound musicality of that unique city. Funds from the sale of the record, titled Our New Orleans, will be donated to Habitat For Humanity to aid those affected by the recent Hurricane Katrina disaster. A number of New Orleans’ best known musicians have been asked to record songs that are integral to their lives and that express their feelings about the city and the recent events there. Sessions began in New York on September 20, with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and the Wild Magnolias recording at Clinton Studios. Later the same day and on September 21, Allen Toussaint, Irma Thomas and the Dirty Dozen Brass Band recorded at New York’s Avatar Studios. Further sessions in October included Dr. John, Buckwheat Zydeco, and Randy Newman, among others. Nonesuch’s parent company – Warner Bros. Records – is donating all of the production costs for this record, as part of the Warner Music Group’s larger efforts on behalf of the hurricane victims. Many others involved in the project are also generously donating their time and services.

Amazon.com:
Hurricane Katrina may have devastated New Orleans and surrounding Gulf communities in 2005, but it was also a forceful reminder of the Crescent City's world renowned status as the epicenter of much American musical heritage. This benefit album (all net proceeds will be donated to the local relief efforts of Habitat for Humanity, with a portion specifically set aside to provide housing for local musicians left homeless by the disaster) picks up that latter thread, a sometimes bittersweet reminder of how deepy ingrained, yet all-too-fragile, that cultural legacy really is. Allen Toussaint's succulent reworking of his 'Yes We Can Can' sets a rhythmic, optimistic tone that parallels his city's own historical resilience, while Dr. John turns in a bluesy, laid-back 'World I Never Made' that's a sharp contrast to the flashes of anger he showed on Tab Benoit's earlier benefit collection, Voice of the Wetlands. Irma Thomas gives a swampy, timely edge to Bessie Smith's 'Back Water Blues' while others pay tribute to the region's history of gospel (Davell Crawford, Eddie Bo), indigenous cajun folk (Buckwheat Zydeco, Beausolei, Carol Fran) and legacy as the Birthplace of Jazz (vibrantly disparate contributions from Dr. Michael White, Dirty Dozen Brass Band and the venerable Preservation Hall Jazz Band). The Wild Magnolias' medley 'Brother John Is Gone/Herc-Jolly-John' is a joyous, African-rooted gumbo of musical possibilities, while Donald Harrison's sax work with The Wardell Querzergue's Orchestra's on 'What a Wonderful World' is a fine preamble for Toussaint's elegiac solo piano rendition of 'Tipitina and Me.' Randy Newman's closer, a melancholic new version of Good Old Boys' 'Louisiana 1927,' is a tribute to his own N.O. roots whose refrain--'Louisiana, they're trying to wash us away'--is also a forceful, tragic reminder that history does indeed repeat. --Jerry McCulley









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Disc 1:

1. Yes We Can Can - Allen Toussaint
2. World I Never Made - Dr. John
3. Back Water Blues - Irma Thomas
4. Gather by the River - Davell Crawford
5. Cryin' in the Streets - Buckwheat Zydeco
6. Canal Street Blues - Dr. Michael White
7. Brother John Is Gone/Herc-Jolly-John - Wild Magnolias
8. When the Saints Go Marching In - Eddie Bo
9. My Feet Can't Fail Me Now - Dirty Dozen Brass Band
10. Tou' les jours ç'est pas la même - Carol Fran
11. L'Ouragon - BeauSoleil
12. Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans - Preservation Hall Jazz Band
13. Prayer for New Orleans - Charlie Miller
14. What a Wonderful World - The Wardell Quezergue Orchestra featuring Donald Harrison
15. Tipitina and Me - Allen Toussaint
16. Philharmonic Louisiana 1927 - Randy Newman and the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra with members of the New York

Rating: - * My frustration with ordering on Amazon.com ... I tried last winter to order numerous things at Amazon with no success and had to buy them elsewhere and send. I had to go to Border's Books this Fall to order an out of print book (only available through Amazon)because once again I could not move my shopping basket through the purchase at Amazon on-line but salesman did it for me. Very frustrating!!! And I sent an email to Amazon's "contact us" but got no response. Thanks. The CD was for my son so I have not heard it. I would have bought more on several occasions but was not able to finish the purchases. Thanks for asking. Rating: - * Nice way to send support to New Orleans area ... After visiting New Orleans recently I have tried to help the area in any way I can. Buying this great cd with loads of great tunes is one small way I can help, and it is so worth it, the music is fabulous!! Rating: - * Goin' home to New Orleans ... This was not of very good quality and the performers (?) did not do justice to the honoree. Rating: - * Still best post-Katrina album ... two-and-a-half years after the "event" and this music is the best story of what we lost. Rating: - * Emotionally honest lament for loss, but beautiful signs of hope ... Yes, there is a melancholy, tragic quality to this collection. The emotional honesty and pain of the artists, all of whom experienced great personal loss in Katrina, is almost unbearable in places. And yet there is a toughness, a fierce determination to rise again, that shows through. New Orleans, America's great city of celebration, is too deep and rich to simply party as an escape from the agony. This music, like this city, confronts the pain honestly, but in the end if certain it will survive. Especially beautiful is when this exercise takes on a spiritual cast, as the singers lay their burdens down at the feet of the Lord and trust in his goodness. As one who lives in New Orleans and is working with Katrina victims on a daily basis, this all rings very true. The sad but hopeful tone of Allen Toussaint "Yes We Can Can," Davell Crawford "Gather By the River" is just beyond description. Two of the lovliest songs I have ever heard. Beausoleil "L'ouragon" and Randy Newman's "Louisiana 1927" are also highlights. But frankly there isn't a week song on the disc. Certainly my favorite album of the year.