As we segue from Black History Month into Women’s History Month—and race towards Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) on Mar. 1—it is only fitting that for today’s Black Music Sunday, we march in the saints by featuring the “Clarinet Queen” of New Orleans, Mrs. Doreen Ketchens.
The COVID-19 epidemic has shut down many of the live music performances in New Orleans, including the world-famous celebration of Mardi Gras. It’s the city's largest tourist attraction and one of its longest local musical traditions. I wrote about some of those traditions in 2020’s Black History Month: Celebrating 'Iko Iko,' Mardi Gras Indians, and the second line.”
This year, as celebrations resume, mask requirements remain in place for indoor gatherings, and “all participants in Carnival parades and Marching Clubs parades must be fully vaccinated … or provide evidence of a negative test taken 72 hours before the parade rolls.”
Most of us, of course, will not be able to travel to New Orleans to celebrate Mardi Gras, though these days, the magical internet that connects us all can bring the spirit into your home.
I defy you to try to sit still while listening to Doreen Ketchens play and sing “When the Saints Go Marching In” on Royal Street in this video from 2020’s Mardi Gras celebration. Wondering why nobody’s wearing masks? Held in late February that year, “the timing of Carnival could hardly have been worse, with the festivities picking up steam just before shutdowns were recommended by federal officials.”
But back to the music.
Ketchen’s band, Doreen’s Jazz New Orleans group, offers this bio on its website.
Doreen's Jazz New Orleans brings the best of New Orleans to every performance. We are a group whose primary interest lies in spreading the culture and traditional music of New Orleans all over the world, through performances and education. Doreen’s Jazz has traveled the world performing their joyful, energetic original and soulful New Orleans jazz in (47) states and (24) countries and counting with outstanding musicianship. We have appeared performing in numerous radio and television shows, national commercials, music videos and movies.
Though blacklisted and unappreciated by the “New Orleans Performance [Clique],” Doreen’s Jazz has managed to establish a stellar reputation, millions of fans around the world, as well as Internet fame. We have over 85 million views and several viral videos!
Most jazz fans are familiar with Louis Armstrong’s classic 1938 recording of “When the Saints Go Marching In,” along with his many other renditions and performances of the song.
Yet Ketchens, who was born and raised in New Orleans, has been dubbed “Little Louis,” due to her extraordinary virtuosity on the clarinet. After listening to her play, I wouldn’t dub her “little” anybody; Ketchens is herself, and is surely worthy of the “Clarinet Queen” title.
She’s no slouch when it comes to her vocals, either. Give a listen to her rendition of “The House of the Rising Sun.”
But who is Doreen Ketchens, and how did she become a virtuoso in her own right? Adriana Lopez profiled the Clarinet Queen in 2018; It expands on the “blacklisting” mentioned above.
Doreen grew up in Tremé, a New Orleans neighborhood that birthed several extraordinary musicians including Kermit Ruffins, Trombone Shorty, Louis Prima, and The Rebirth Brass Band, just to name a few. In the fifth grade while attending Joseph Craig Elementary, she signed up for the school band in order to escape a pop quiz. She was tasked with learning how to play the clarinet – her second choice, after all the other girls signed up for the flute. It was under the guidance of her junior high school band director that she was pushed into practicing more, and in high school, while attending John F. Kennedy High School, she was accepted into the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts—an arts conservatory for Louisiana high school students, responsible for graduates like Wynton Marsalis, Jon Batiste, Wendell Pierce, Trombone Shorty, Harry Connick Jr, and Terrance Osborne, among others.
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During her university years, Doreen attended The Hartt School at The University of Hartford in Connecticut through a scholarship from The New York Philharmonic. She also completed an internship with the symphony in Hartford. A woman of many talents, Doreen worked her way through conservatories and college as a chef.
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She formed her band called the Jackson Square All Stars, and they began playing in the French Quarter’s Jackson Square. The name eventually evolved to Doreen’s Jazz New Orleans, making Doreen the first female bandleader. However, they had trouble booking shows at traditional venues due to the prevalent chauvinism of the club owners. Despite that, they found success with their street shows, and eventually through jazz festivals and sales of their albums.
Ketchens was recently interviewed by Ted Koppel and featured on CBS Sunday Morning, which she posted to her YouTube channel.
From the CBS News companion story:
Among the musicians hit hardest by the pandemic are the ones who, usually, work on the street.
Like millions of other Americans, Doreen Ketchens (on clarinet), husband Lawrence (on the tuba), and daughter Dorian (on drums) worked from home. As many of us have learned, Zoom is helpful, but it's kind of flat. And when you can't see your audience at all, the chemistry is gone. For Doreen and her family, the spark is on the street.
You would have seen the difference immediately on an unseasonably warm and sunny December morning at the corner of Royal Street and St. Peter. That intersection, as Ben Jaffe told Koppel, is recognized throughout the community as belonging to Doreen: "You don't touch Doreen's corner!" Jaffe said. "That corner is the Times Square of the French Quarter. She is world famous."
While Ketchens may prefer playing on the street, she has also demonstrated her ability to play with a classical orchestra. Here she is performing the jazz and gospel classic, “Just a Closer Walk With Thee,” accompanied by the Louisiana Philharmonic in Mar. 2018.
In Nov. 2014, New Orleans community radio station WWOZ-FM, currently operated by the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Foundation, featured Ketchens in a 20-minute live performance from their studios.
In closing, here’s a cheerful two-minute “Twosday” message—and some more music—from Ketchens this week.
Join me in the comments to get our Mardi Gras celebration started early!