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I took this photo at Luscher Charter School in New Orleans, LA

I was recently contacted by a Wikipedia contributor to licence one of my photos of Kidd Jordan for use on Wikipedia. I was happy to oblidge if not only to be able to show the rest of the world a little bit about one of my favorite New Orleans musicians. Mr. Jordan is one of the cities best, but seldom seen, saxaphone players. Through my work for the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation, I have had the privilege of meeting him several times at Luscher Charter School where he teaches weekly music classes for the Heritage School of Music. Please read the article and learn a litle bit about him. His music is available on iTunes. If you ever hear of him playing in New Orleans, please tell me. His shows are fantastic.

“Edward “Kidd” Jordan (born in Crowley, Louisiana, United States, May 5, 1935) is an American jazz saxophonist and music educator from New Orleans, Louisiana.
After completing a music degree at Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he relocated to New Orleans. He taught at Southern University at New Orleans from 1974 to 2006.
Jordan performs on tenor, baritone, soprano, alto, C-melody and sopranino saxophones, as well as contrabass and bass clarinets. He has performed and recorded with a wide selection of musicians in styles ranging from R&B to avant-garde jazz, including Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, William Parker, Alvin Fielder, Archie Shepp, Fred Anderson, Ornette Coleman, Ellis Marsalis, Cannonball Adderley, Ed Blackwell, and Cecil Taylor. In 2008 he was awarded a lifetime recognition honor by the Vision Festival.[1]
In his performances and recordings his music is entirely improvised: “Everything you hear on my albums is improvised.” he explains. “It’s collective improvisation, but there are no tunes. I tried writing down ideas a long time ago but I don’t do that anymore.”[2].

The French Ministry of Culture recognized Jordan as a Knight (Chevalier) of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1985. The French government bestowed him with their highest artistic award for his impetus as a visionary educator and performer. His imaginative sense of listening first brought together four outstanding saxophonists[citation needed]: Julius Hemphill, Hamiet Bluiett, Oliver Lake, and David Murray, who as the World Saxophone Quartet would be one of the most outstanding jazz ensembles throughout the 1980s.
As an instructor of jazz studies at Southern University at New Orleans, Jordan encouraged his students to pursue new approaches to traditional musical forms. Taking up on his advice, one student named Charles Joseph, a young trombonist, would become the brainchild for The Dirty Dozen Brass Band sound. By mixing elements of traditional jazz, bebop, and free jazz with R&B music, the DDBB would revitalize the New Orleans’ brass band sound in the early 1980s. The brass band tune “Kidd Jordan’s Second Line” was written by Kidd on the eve of the DDBB first European appearance in 1982; furthermore, Kidd fronted the DDBB on sopranino for their controversial performance in Groningen, Netherlands. In time, “Kidd Jordan’s Second Line” would be recorded by the Dirty Dozen and Rebirth Brass Bands).” FULL ARTICLE.

View my music photography portfolio here

I find in my life abroad from Oklahoma that a lot of people really have no idea of what is in the state. Most people have an image in their head of Oklahoma as a treeless prairie; gray with dusty wind, and void of hills and color. I also find that people who visit are very surprised. The first thing people usually notice are the friendly people. That is how Oklahoma City got the nickname “The Big Friendly”.

Oklahoma City has changed imensely since I have been away. There are high-scale restaraunts everywhere, museums, and parks. Downtown Oklahoma City has been renewed with the life that the Bricktown Canal has brought, and the building of townhouses and apartments in the city center which is bringing people back to the downtown area to live.

Travel in the country side and you will find beautiful green rolling hills, covered with dense trees and tall grasses. Scattred throughout the state their are the glorious oil mansions; leftover from the haydays of the companies like Conoco and Phillips Petroleum.

The culture of the Native Americans still survives with pow-wows and tribal art.

Oklahoma is many things, but it is seldom what an outsider expects.

ENTER THE OKLAHOMA GALLERY HERE

Enter the New Orleans Oddities Gallery

Whether I have been going to a job, traveling to a friend’s house, or just exploring the neighborhoods, I have spent years driving through the streets of New Orleans and have naturally encountred some of the oddities that the city holds. Sometimes its a funny sign, sometimes its strange house, and sometimes its just something that is falling apart. No matter what it is, I usually have my camera with me to document it. It has become an ongoing project that never seems to get old for me and I have put it together in an album called “New Orleans Oddities”. Please enjoy the gallery.

Enter the New Orleans Oddities Gallery

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“Nom e espana!” or this is not Spain.  You often see this displayed on bumper stickers, shirts, and grafiti throughout Galicia, Spain.  And in many ways it is true.  Galicia, although technically in Spain, does not feel like Spain.  There are no bullfights, no flamenco music, and tapas, and no warm sandy desert.  Instead you will find  a rainy land on Spain’s northwest coast which, for some strange reason, seems to have more in common with Ireland than Andalusia.  Here you will find green rolling hills, draped in fog and superstitions of witches (bruxas) and wizards (meixas).  Galician’s also play the bagpipes instead of the guitar, and like their Atlantic cousins in Ireland, have a Celtic history.

So, if you go to Galicia, visit the tomb of St. James in the famed Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.  Or visit the Tower of Hercules in A Coruña.  At the very least travel north and see the beautiful “Beach of the Cathedrals” in San Miguel.

I spent a year there when I was 1 9 and made some lifelong friends.  Two of my Galician friends, Rut Rey, and Fernando Anton traveled to the Unitied States to study in Iowa upon my return.  During their three years in the states, the always traveled from Iowa to spend Christmas with my family and I.  They have since moved to Belgium, but they were gracious enough to let me spend Christmas with their family a few years ago.  Below are some the photos I took during my year there and from my Christmas with them.  Enjoy.

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The music of New Orleans is a perfect soundtrack to the city.   The history of the music perhaps is what makes it so particularly interesting.  From the earliest days, New Orleans music has always been about the fusion of influences.  Black slaves were brought to New Orleans from varied locations;  as far north as Kentucky and Virginia, and also from the Caribbean.  They brought with them their traditions of rhythm and call and response singing.

In New Orleans, black slaves were allowed Sunday afternoons off from their work and would practice these traditions along with dance in what is currently referred to as “Congo Square”, located behind the French Quarter.

It does not take much insight to imagine what happened next in the evolution of New Orleans music.  As European instruments became incorporated into the exotic music of Congo Square, this music took one step closer to becoming what we know as Jazz.  Just add a bit of ragtime and blues music to this recipe, and you have the birth of Jazz.

New Orleans is still very proud of its musical heritage and it was my good fortune to become involved in what has developed to be my favorite photographic subject.  New Orleans’ music.

Whether it is in the candle light of Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop on Bourbon Street or the bright lights of Tipitina’s, I have photographed it all.

My work with the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation has led me to work with legends and up-and-comers alike.  Perhaps what has been most interesting and inspiring to me is the work of those whose goal it is to preserve the heritage of New Orleans music.  People such as Kent and Kidd Jordan who work for the New Orleans Heritage School of Music and truly the guardians of the musical flame.  They pass along their wisdom to a new generation not only with instruction of the instruments but also the story behind them.

New Orleans music is also a family and I am so glad that I have gotten to become a member of that family.

Please enjoy my music photography gallery.

ENTER GALLERY HERE