Gwen Thompkins

Big Freedia may not be the earliest pioneer of bounce, the high-energy genre that calls New Orleans home, but she has been its most well-known ambassador.

Ma Rainey's Black Bottom made its debut last year with a striking cast of characters, but it was Branford Marsalis' job to make the music take flight.

Sutton, who appeared in more than 100 movies, plays and television shows over a career that spanned almost 50 years, died this past week of complications from the coronavirus.

Singers Sam Craft and Alexis Marceaux describe their very different experiences with COVID-19. Plus hear the uniquely New Orleanian story of how the band celebrated the release of its new album.

The New Orleans artist was on her way to getting a master's degree in child psychology when a friend inspired her to focus on music. Hear her soulful, powerful, voice in this session.

Ellis Marsalis, jazz pianist, educator and patriarch of the Marsalis family, has died. His music students included Terence Blanchard, Donald Harrison, Harry Connick, Jr., and four of his sons.

A contemporary of Rosetta Tharpe, gospel singer Mahalia Jackson had one of the great big, gorgeous voices of the 20th century, the echoes of which can still be heard in popular music today.

Listen to a selection of marvelous music from the First Lady of Song, plus music by artists who have felt her influence.

The Latin American Library at Tulane University is digitizing a whopping collection of Cold War-era, must-hear entertainment — Spanish language radionovelas made by Cuban emigrés in Miami.

The city of New Orleans is on a first-name basis with Quint Davis, who has happily occupied a central role in the city's beloved Jazz and Heritage Festival since the very beginning.

African-Americans in the city have paraded in spectacular regalia inspired by Native American motifs for more than a century. The song of the Mardi Gras Indians exudes joy, defiance — and mystery.

Fats Domino has died at 89. Antoine Domino Jr. was a founding father of rock 'n' roll and a recipient of the National Medal of Arts. He daughter says he died of natural causes on Tuesday.

Fats Domino, a founding father of rock-and-roll, has died at age 89. His daughter said that he died Tuesday of natural causes.

Elaine M. Hayes' new book traces the ups and downs of the singer known as the Queen of Bebop, from her great Town Hall debut in 1947 to the cheesy but profitable novelty songs that marred her legacy.

Sometime around the 11th century, Western composers began to make room on the page for a new kind of sound. These notes would fall outside the key of a piece of music — generally a half-step higher or a half-step lower. They could even sound like a mistake. And that's ...

This week, the 77-year-old New Orleans songwriter, producer and arranger Allen Toussaint died after a concert in Madrid. For most of his career, Toussaint preferred working behind the scenes, but our friend Gwen Thompkins met him at a time when he'd thrown himself into performing extensively around the ...

There are a lot of stories to tell about New Orleans.

There are uplifting stories about new houses, new shops and gigantic drainage projects. There are melancholy stories about everything residents lost in Hurricane Katrina, about all that can never be recovered. There are stories about all that remains to ...

From what people remember, he fell like a tree. Malcolm X — all 6 feet, 4 inches of him — had taken a shotgun blast to the chest and a grouping of smaller-caliber bullets to the torso while onstage at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights on Feb. 21, 1965. ...

Did you know that John F. Kennedy was a Republican? Neither did I. But that's what one of my college students guessed in a course on news writing. I asked another kid what period followed the Industrial Age and she said, "The Golden Age?" We moved on.

But whenever I'm ...