Creole Wild West Mardi Gras Indians

If you had a Prince / David Bowie / Tribute Clicker keeping track at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival (Jazz Fest)'s weekend one, it would have been very busy. Royal Teeth performing David Bowie's "Under Pressure" (Click); Preston Shannon's transcendent "Purple Rain" in the Blues Tent (Click); Nick Jonas on "I Would Die 4 U" (Click) -- the tribute hits kept coming.

New Orleans Artist Lionel Milton's Prince

Jazz originals were also the order of the day, with the jazz tent more teeming with humanity than I have ever seen it for a lineup that included the talent incubator NOCCA Jazz Ensemble; Larry Siebert Presents (the blazing) Estrella Banda; New Orleans drummer extraordinaire Herlin Riley; jazz legends Herbie Hancock & Wayne Shorter; and New Orleans' own Terence Blanchard featuring the E-Collective with an ethereal jazz version of Prince's "Diamonds and Pearls" (Click).

Herlin Riley

The picture-perfect weather kept food lines bustling, particularly at any stand where seafood met a butter-based sauce. The fairgrounds racetrack was full of old friends who meet every year through pure synchronicity. Robust crowds are an example of New Orleans' population boom, and someone left fliers on cars parked throughout the neighborhood noting that if tourists are staying in unlicensed short-term rentals, they are keeping locals priced out of living in the town they fought so hard to return to after Hurricane Katrina.

An ever-increasing spotlight on the city is both a curse and a blessing. Beyonc's new video for "Lemonade" is steeped in New Orleans cultural detail, including Mardi Gras Indians, which will help create even more new New Orleaneans.

Today's performers included Big Chief Walter Cook and the Golden Eagles; Big Chief Monk Boudreaux & The Golden Eagles, and tribes marching along with brass bands and social aid and pleasure clubs. For Jazzfest completists, every base was covered on weekend one, down to the Folklife Stage Day of the Dead altar to Allen Toussaint. (Click).

Big Queen Michelle of the Shining Star Hunters Mardi Gras Indian Tribe

Photos by Jeff Beninato