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When the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival kicks off this week, an array of native heroes will dominate the lineup. Among their ranks, as standard, might be Trombone Shorty<\/strong> (Troy Andrews<\/strong>)<\/a>, the most popular musician within the Big Easy; Oscar-and-Grammy-toting dynamo Jon Batiste<\/a>,<\/strong> who graced the official poster of the 2022 pageant; the Dixie Cups, featured on this<\/em> 12 months\u2019s poster; Irma Thomas,<\/strong> the soul queen of New Orleans; and perennial crowd-pleasers Boyfriend<\/strong> and Big Freedia.<\/strong> Also on the invoice<\/a> might be representatives of a constellation of musical households from the Crescent City, with names like Batiste, Benoit, Boutt\u00e9, Brunious, Lastie, Marsalis, Neville, and Payton. There might be tributes to the late Wayne Shorter and Tina Turner, in addition to units billed as jazz funerals for Russell Batiste and Jimmy Buffett\u2014with the latter having kicked off his musical profession in NOLA. Headlining the entire shebang\u2014unsurprisingly\u2014might be a band of scruffy rock and blues veterans (ages 80, 80, and 76, respectively) who collectively go by the title the Rolling Stones.<\/p>\n But this 12 months there might be one New Orleanian onstage whose presence looms particularly massive. And that might be Trem\u00e9-raised trumpet legend James Andrews<\/strong><\/a> (the eldest brother of Trombone Shorty), who is usually unsung and underappreciated in a city that breeds jazz and blues giants.<\/p>\n Andrews, also referred to as 12, might be most recognizable from his appearances on the HBO sequence Treme.<\/em> And for returning together with his brother Troy to a devastated New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina<\/a>, the place, 17 days after the deluge, he vowed to the souls gathered in Jackson Square: \u201cWe\u2019re gonna rebuild this city, note by note.\u201d Today, nevertheless, Andrews is simply as vocal\u2014and ever-present. \u201cForget New York City jazz,\u201d he lately declared, sounding like an official civic emissary. \u201cNew Orleans<\/em> is the home of traditional jazz. We\u2019re on a mission to keep telling the world about New Orleans music. To spread it everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s been fairly a month for Andrews, 55. Between exhibits in Switzerland and Ottawa, he performed a showcase in April on the ultimate day of the annual French Quarter Fest<\/a>, a neighborly amalgam of 1,700 performers who play at 20-plus venues all through one of the crucial storied and historic districts in New Orleans. He has a brand new album, James Andrews & the Crescent City Allstars<\/em><\/a>\u2014\u201cAvailable on vinyl!\u201d as he lately shouted from the stage. \u201cWe\u2019re getting next<\/em> year\u2019s Grammy!\u201d\u2014that was recorded at his brother\u2019s studio, Buckjump, within the Lower Garden District. He has a brand new initiative, the New Orleans Musicians Burial Fund<\/a>, supposed to assist cowl the interment prices for performers who, as Andrews explains, \u201cdidn\u2019t have insurance for a proper place of burial or, if they or their families wanted it, to have a dignified jazz funeral.\u201d<\/p>\n And this Saturday, he\u2019ll take up his standard Jazz Fest perch, positive to placed on a gig that\u2019s a spotlight of the pageant resulting from his knack for rousing a crowd with manic vitality, unbridled optimism, and gravel-voiced wisecracks. Andrews has turn out to be, in impact, a sort of musical mayor of town\u2014\u201cone of the primary cultural ambassadors from the cradle of music,\u201d as Karen Dalton Beninato<\/strong> says within the new disc\u2019s liner notes. \u201cI\u2019ve been to every Jazz Fest,\u201d he maintains, explaining his attendance tally, which matches again to 1970 (when the occasion was based<\/a> by music-festival impresario George Wein, with Quint Davis<\/strong> and Allison Miner). \u201cThere\u2019s a picture of me\u2014at five!\u2014at the first one, in Congo Square.\u201d<\/p>\n Since the 2021 passing of the household matriarch, Lois Nelson Andrews<\/a>, son James, the eldest grandchild, has taken on the mantle of the Andrews, Nelson, and Hill households. This circle contains his musician siblings Troy, Terry \u201cBuster,\u201d<\/strong> and Bruce<\/strong> (in addition to the late Darnell \u201cD-Boy\u201d), together with assorted cousins corresponding to Keva Holiday<\/strong> (she sings on his new album), Revert \u201cPeanut,\u201d Glen David<\/a>,<\/strong> Glen \u201cBuddha\u201d Finister, Eldridge, Tyrone, Rodrick,<\/strong> and the late Travis \u201cTrumpet Black\u201d Hill, in addition to \u201ca couple of Tyreeks and a million Glens,\u201d says Andrews. \u201cAnd Herlin Riley,<\/strong> who played with Wynton Marsalis<\/strong>\u2014and all these youngsters coming, including my son Jenard.<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWithout James Andrews,\u201d drummer Glen Finister noticed late final 12 months<\/a>, \u201ca lot of us wouldn\u2019t be playing music and wouldn\u2019t be where we are\u2026. James put everyone on their first gig.\u201d (Full disclosure: My son, Sam Friend<\/a>,<\/strong> a New Orleans\u2013primarily based musician, performed his first Jazz Fest with Andrews and sometimes performs with him.)<\/p>\n With Jazz Fest quick approaching, the Crescent City Allstars\u2019 most up-to-date headlining gig continues to be contemporary in my reminiscence. Two Sundays in the past, because the solar was setting on the French Quarter Fest\u2019s Jackson Square stage, Andrews addressed the assembled, his limbs and trumpet all swaying like a type of flailing inflatable stick figures widespread at used-car tons. He implored the viewers to lift each palms within the air, as if in celebration. Then, looking on the sea of waving arms, he cracked, \u201cWatch your wallets! This is the French Quarter!\u201d<\/p>\n He performed his authentic composition \u201cThe Big Time Stuff,\u201d<\/a> together with John Boutt\u00e9<\/strong>\u2019s \u201cTreme Song (Down in the Treme),\u201d which Andrews has adopted as a kind of theme tune. He then broke into his late grandfather Jessie Hill\u2019s signature, \u201cOoh Poo Pah Doo,\u201d accompanied on the refrain by the bouncing crowd.<\/p>\n He introduced his cousin Keva Holiday<\/a> to the bandstand to sing the gospel staple \u201cOh Happy Day.\u201d He introduced up jazz icon Cassandra Wilson.<\/strong> He introduced up Trombone Shorty\u2014to play drums, no much less\u2014shouting to the viewers as he shoved two James Andrews albums into his brother\u2019s palms, \u201cRepeat after me: Crescent City Allstars dot com! Crescent City Allstars dot com!\u201d He introduced up a Mardi Gras Indian in full regalia and a succession of so-called child dolls<\/a> (conventional umbrella-holding, bloomer-festooned revelers, whose ranks have been revived by his mom).<\/p>\n And then he introduced down the home, fairly actually. Without informing the police\u2014or so he proclaimed from the stage\u2014he requested everybody in Jackson Square to observe him in an impromptu \u201csecond line\u201d procession to a close-by bar. \u201cIt\u2019s the 40th anniversary of French Quarter Fest,\u201d he mentioned. \u201cWe ain\u2019t never done this<\/em> before.\u201d And with that, the brash man with the brass band strode northwest up St. Peter Street, taking part in \u201cWhen the Saints Go Marching In.\u201d Festivalgoers trailed him, 20 abreast, weaving out and in of site visitors to the spacious, old-school tavern B Mac\u2019s, whose homeowners didn\u2019t know what hit \u2019em.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re good people,\u201d Andrews insisted. \u201cI wanted to throw them some business.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n