The Revelers have taken their music coast to coast in the U.S. and around the world from Ireland to Denmark, and back to their own Black Pot Festival in Lafayette, Louisiana. Now Orcas Center is amped to bring The Revelers to the island for the first time to share their musical culture.
Bring your family and friends on Saturday, Dec. 3 at 7:30 p.m. for a tonic of roots music.
The Revelers, founding members of the Red Stick Ramblers and The Pine Leaf Boys — unquestionably the two groups at the vanguard of the Louisiana cultural renaissance — have joined together to form a Louisiana supergroup that combines swamp-pop, Cajun, country, blues and zydeco. The genre of swamp pop is Southwest Louisiana’s answer to the R&B and rock ’n roll that came out of New Orleans, Memphis and Detroit in the 50s. When that sound reached Cajun and zydeco musicians, they played their own versions — sometimes in French — and traded in their fiddles and accordions for horns and electric guitars.
As individuals, each of The Revelers are in high demand, having performed and recorded with T-Bone Burnett, Natalie Merchant and Linda Ronstadt, to name a few. As a group, they play with a sense of empathy and depth that can only be fostered after years of making music together. They have all appeared on the 2011 season finale of “Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations” and were featured musicians for HBO’s “Tremé.”
Here is what the critics are saying about The Revelers:
“Groove bound and dance compelling …”
— Offbeat Magazine
“There has to be at least one band in the country that reveres the past and is unafraid about dragging it into the future. Mark down the Revelers as that band, musicians who aren’t afraid of mixing up accordion, fiddles, saxophones and guitars. Sometimes the greasiest gumbo can also be the best, as anyone within earshot of this mess will attest. Bon ton all night long.” — The Morton Report, Bentley’s Bandstand
Tickets for The Revelers are $27, $19 for students, $6 off for Orcas Center members, and may be purchased at www.orcascenter.org or by calling 376-2281 ext. 1 or visiting the Orcas Center Box Office open Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 12 to 2 p.m. There are $5 subsidized tickets available at the box office.
