If you look down to fiddle with your radio dial, you might drive right through Iota, Louisiana, and miss it. With a population of about 1400, it certainly is appropriately named. But if you go there to witness their Mardi Gras celebration, you're going to behold a rootsy event that captures the spirit of the celebration as it's evolved for the past 200 years.
Tee Mamou Mardi Gras, 300 Duson Avenue, Iota, LA 70543-6018
Large Wood Dance Floor
9:00AM to 5:00PM
Food, beverages, vendors. Bring a chair
9:00AM Festival Opening Ceremonies
9:30AM St. Joseph's Choir
10:00AM Corey Ledet and his Zydeco Band (LA Zydeco)
12:15PM Megan Brown and Tepetate (LA Cajun)
1:00PM Les Tous Petite Mardi Gras (Children's Mardi Gras)
2:30PM Scotty Pousson and the Pointe aux Loups Playboys (LA Cajun)
2:30PM Tee Mamou Iota Mardi Gras Parade Through Town
Part One: Sketches from Iota
These past few days have been some of the best times I've spent in southwest Louisiana...but I've said that before. This part of America is not exempt from the worries covering the country like a fog that some days seems so thick it'll never end. But down here during Mardi Gras, CNN takes a back seat to FUN...about a week or two leading up to Fat Tuesday - Mardi Gras Day.
The best part of Mardi Gras down here is that it's celebrated everywhere. People in tiny towns sprinkled over the prairies don’t pack up the car and head for New Orleans.
People in Basile, Church Point, Duralde, Elton, Eunice, Crowley, Gheens, Mamou, Soileau, and Iota, drive or walk down to Main Street where I guarantee you there will be a parade, live Cajun or zydeco music, booths selling home made jambalaya, etoufee, red beans and rice, and fried shrimp, along with home made arts and crafts. That's exactly what happened in Iota yesterday.
Every time I say, "How you doin' this morning," seems to be an invitation to a conversation about history, food, music, a funny story, or a way of life. If any one of the Cajuns or creoles I've met down here felt I was interested, and appreciated their towns and culture, I swear they'd give me the shirts off their backs if they thought I was in need. Modern self-absorbed life simply hasn’t found a hospitable environment down here.
If this were up a baseball game, Mardi Gras on March 8 would have been called off because of rain. Down here, tourists and locals packed umbrellas along with lawn chairs - they knew it would take an act of God to bump a Mardi Gras celebration.
Part Two: Sketches from Iota
10:30 AM
All I knew is I wanted to begin Mardi Gras in a small Louisiana backwater town. Iota, population a tick over 1400, is perfect. Way out in the middle of rice and crawfish flatlands, Iota is a self-contained package of Americana – no chain stores, no malls, just an unassuming and authentic place that could probably pass as a “living history” installation in the Smithsonian.
Under leaden skies and scudding clouds, I slow down when I see cars parked along the road and down side streets, and families toting umbrellas and lawn chairs. Park. Shut down the GPS. Follow the crowd. A few hundred yards down Duson Avenue, the thumping beat of Corey Ledet’s Zydeco Band comes into range. So do rows of little concession stands on both sides of the street selling food, crafts, and memorabilia.
Little clusters of locals exchange greetings in the street. This might be their twentieth, thirtieth, fiftieth or seventieth Mardi Gras on Duson Avenue. Not much has changed. There’s a parade, music, dancing, food, and that sense of place particular to belonging to a locale for generations.
Some cultures thrive on identity but are reluctant to allow others inside. Not here. Cajuns are willing, even eager, to share what they have with outsiders who appreciate it, who might have come long distances to witness it. Music, dancing, and a steadfast sense of identity lures the tourists and dancers but so does the friendliness of these Louisianans who sense the outsiders’ respect for their culture.
Part Three: Sketches from Iota
Amidst the concession stands and storefronts along Duson Avenue is an elevated plywood dance floor and a covered bandstand. Spectators surround the staging area. Many bring chairs. The truly foresighted bring umbrellas. Corey Ledet and His Zydeco Band have been playing since 10 AM. For spectators, this is a free concert. For dancers from near and far, this is nirvana. The only thing that clears the stage is an occasional five-minute soaking from the heavens during which everyone ducks for cover or pops the umbrellas. The musicians under cover of the stage just keep on playing. (VIDEO)
Music is as much a part of prairie culture as rice and beans. As a genre, Cajun music is bulletproof. The tail has never wagged the dog. Early musical influences from Africa, Spain, Haiti, Germany and later ones from Kentucky, Tennessee, and Texas, melted into Cajun music like a roux into gumbo. Add R&B and the same thing happened to the Creole zydeco music being pounded out by Corey Ledet this morning.
Maybe it’s the unique sound of the music, maybe it’s the friendliness of the people who love dancing to it, maybe it’s the welcoming attitude of the natives of the prairies – whatever it is, Cajun and zydeco music has a huge following. Local men like Antoine Melancon from St. Martinville who’s been featured on regional billboards, Leon and Nancy who invite me to Sawdust Days in Wisconsin, Kay originally from Birmingham, Janet from North Carolina, a trio of women from Denver, Mohammad from Boston, Frieda from Providence – and a bunch more I’ve seen at dances the past few days plus locals share the elevated dance floor. This is one happy place.
Part Four: Sketches from Iota
12:15 PM
Mother Nature isn’t in the mood to throw beads today. Maybe the celebrations the past few nights have kept her awake. She covers Iota with bursts of rain that last about as long as one good waltz…just to remind us we can take Mardi Gras for granted but not her weather. I need shelter. Some kind of music is streaming from somewhere inside the American Legion Hall. I head in – and for the next two hours witness the past, the present, and the future of Cajun music.
Smack in the middle of a band of grown men on a tiny stage to the right of the entrance playing Cajun two steps is a blonde headed boy staring intently at his music stand, his fingers dancing accurately up and down the frets of his fiddle. On the other side of the stage to the right of the door is a girl playing an accordion.
Just about every member of a Cajun or zydeco band in Louisiana has a relative who plays music in one or more bands. I’ve seen little boys playing the rub board alongside their fathers or uncles at zydeco dances. This is the first time I’ve seen youngsters playing with their elders in a Cajun band. (They played on a small stage in the street earlier today.)
James, Alex, and Bobby Caswell are well aware they’re passing the torch. Eric and Elizabeth Kelley are well aware they’re next in line. These two kids from Port Meches, TX have been playing together for a few years. They sing the traditional songs in Cajun French. Under the radar here in Iota, they’re in an apprenticeship, absorbing not just the musical notes but the social vibe that connects them with their audience. One can only hope these kids are in it for the long haul.
Then there are the Caswells. Guitar player James from Jennings, his cousin 62 year old guitarist Bobby from Vinton, LA, or “anyplace my RV is parked;” and Alex Caswell, the singer in the blue cowboy shirt.
For the first few minutes, I stand a few feet away from the band beside a fellow with a serious camera.
“Where you from?” says I.
“Sweden,” says he.
“How the heck you end up here?” says I.
“Boy meets girl story,” says the man, who is the editor of the Welsh Louisiana Citizen. Great. A Swede, living in a Louisiana town named Welsh and married to an American wife (sick today, can’t come).
The American Legion Hall at 109 Duson Avenue is a small wood frame building that probably looks like hundreds of others across rural America. One large multi purpose room, a small bar in the far corner, a little stage in another corner, folding chairs that can be arranged theater style or, like today, in a perimeter to permit people to dance. Families and couples sit, listen, and buy drinks at the bar or paper plates of red beans, rice, and boudin. Farm ball caps advertising feed or seed outnumber the ones with LSU.
It’s pouring outside. The food, music, and the ordinariness of the goings on inside here feel right. Somewhere out there in the rain, a town Mardi Gras parade is going on. I’m happy to sit here and talk to a couple from Iowa and a photographer from Memphis, who are also foregoing the parade. There is something special going on here.
I sit down next to a woman and a man keeping time to the music with his foot. Over the sound of the music I get talking to Farland Henry. “I was born here and moved to Orange, Texas. The man in the blue shirt is Alex Caswell, he’s the retired water works supervisor in Orange.”
By the time he’s done giving me the low down on the Caswells, I learn he’s a Korean War vet, loves the music, and can’t dance because of a bum knee. He gives me a thumbs up every time I hit the dance floor and salutes when I get into waltzing and two stepping with the graceful photojournalist from Memphis. When I walk over to say goodbye, he reaches up and gives me a big hug. “Glad you have such a good time with our music,” he says. Special.
Then there’s the edgy Bobby Caswell. During a short break, I approach him to tell him how much I enjoy the time here. He offers to buy me a beer. “What have you learned?” he says.
I start with the trinity of music, food, and people - Bobby stops me in my tracks. His steely blue eyes fix on mine. “You don’t know music until you feel it. We feel it. We sing songs like ‘Les Flammes d’Envers (The Flames of Hell).’ Our music is about heartbreak and hell and we sing it so it sounds like heaven.” With that, he strides back to the bandstand.
The declaration is from the man who stood on the band stand a few minutes ago and said, with no small amount of fervor, “Put your right hand on your hearts, we’re about to sing The Cajun National Anthem,” then proceeded to unleash a heartfelt version of “Jolie Blonde.” Every time I passed that little bandstand I moved my hand from my dance partner’s back and placed it over my heart. I don’t take that degree of fervor lightly.
Two hours have passed. I’ve chosen to stay here during the Children’s Mardi Gras Parade (VIDEO) and the Tee Mamou Iota Mardi Gras Parade Through town at 2:30 PM. This is as close to an old fashioned ‘bal de maison’ (Cajun house party) as I’m likely to encounter but perhaps closer to a religious ceremony in which music is offered to the Maker, a harmonic burning of incense, it’s smoke rising to the heavens buoyed by the chords produced by young acolytes and venerable priests.
Music has bound this community together for 200 years. Maybe Bobby Caswell was right. This music is a temporary experience of heaven on earth.
Part Five: Sketches from Iota
2:30 PM
I’m halfway to my car, heading to hear Chubby Carrier play at Crowley’s Mardi Gras. A downpour sends everyone for cover. Ten quick steps away is the Iota -Egan Lion’s Club tent. The way things have been going today I should have known the choice would present me with another dose of Louisiana pride.
Donald Smith has been here since early morning and is still full of energy… and a hamper of sandwiches that need to find homes in celebrants’ tummies.
“Y’know, every bit of food sold on this side of the street has to be home made. The bread on these sandwiches, home made. The pork, home cooked.”
I’m still smiling, in my reportorial mode, taking in the scene, scribbling notes, and doing my best to stay dry under the edge of the Iota Lions Club’s tent as rain sweeps Duson Avenue.
“We’ve been doing this for 24 years. Every penny we take in goes to charity. One of them is the Lions Club Eye Foundation that buys eyeglasses for the elderly around Iota. The other is the camp for crippled children that the New Orleans chapter runs every year.”
This is not salesmanship talking. It’s pride, the old fashioned kind that believes in good works, with no reward except the pleasure of giving.
A few Q and As later, Donald learns I’m a big fan of music and dancing.
“Larry Miller lives right down the street. He makes accordions. Every Sunday before Mardi Gras he has a big jam fest, puts on a pig roast in his yard and invites everyone. People from as far as Costa Rica, Germany, and France come here. They play everything from bluegrass to Cajun, and they’re all friendly people.”
There’s a cultural glue that holds this part of the country together. If you ask a Cajun or creole man or woman who their folks are, I’ll bet the concept of six degrees of separation could be whittled down to three or four. For example, as I do some googling while I write this story, I discover that Blake Miller, the young man I heard playing accordion with The Red Stick Ramblers on March 3 at The Blue Moon Saloon (scroll down "News") in Lafayette, is Larry Miller’s grandson.
The rain has abated. Those pork sandwiches on homemade bread are looking mighty good. My hunger for food has finally trumped my hunger for information. Donald Smith sells me one of those pork sandwiches. He’s already sold me on Iota.
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