Tuxedo Brass Band

On Friday, the Tuxedo Brass Band performed at Loyola University and it was probably the coolest thing I have seen so far. I had always wanted to see a traditional brass band play here in NOLA and I was hoping to just stumble upon a wedding or something but the fact that they performed at my school was great!

First, they talked about how they had been around for a long time (since the 1910's I think) and musicians such as Louis Armstrong and Mutt Carey have been in it. Now, they call themselves the Young Tuxedo Brass Band as a spin-off of the original brass band.One thing that interested me was how they perform at  funerals. The leader of the band said there's 3 stages in funerals: 1) the march song that lets everyone at the funeral know the band arrived 2) the dirge and 3) an uplifting song after the person is dropped in the ground. The video is of an example of an dirge song that is normally played called "What a Friend We Have in Jesus". Enjoy!

I really enjoyed this band because I've been obsessed with old brass band music since I started playing jazz and hearing them play was amazing. I think it's definitely something to be on the look out for in NOLA.