The Sugar Maple Music Festival, with the help of a grant from Dane Arts, is pleased to announce another session in the Virtual Roots & Reasons Series. 

One of the brightest young talents to emerge in Cajun, Creole and Zydeco music over the last decade, Cedric Watson is a four-time Grammy-nominated fiddler, singer, accordionist & songwriter with seemingly unlimited potential.

Friday, March 12, 2021
5:30 pm CST
Streaming live on Facebook

Originally from San Felipe, TX, Cedric made his first appearance at the age of 19 at the Zydeco Jam at The Big Easy in Houston, TX. Just two years later, he moved to south Louisiana, quickly immersing himself in French music and language. Over the next several years, Cedric performed French music in 17 countries and on 7 full-length albums with various groups, including the Pine Leaf Boys, Corey Ledet, Les Amis Creole with Ed Poullard and J.B. Adams, and with his own group, Bijou Creole.

With an apparently bottomless repertoire of songs at his fingertips, Cedric plays everything from forgotten Creole melodies and obscure Dennis McGee reels to more modern Cajun and Zydeco songs, even occasionally throwing in a bluegrass fiddle tune or an old string band number. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he is also a prolific songwriter, writing almost all of his songs on his double row Hohner accordion. Cedric’s songs channel his diverse ancestry (African, French, Native American and Spanish) to create his own brand of sounds.

Cedric’s albums are a tapestry of pulsing rhythms and Creole poetry, and his live performances are unforgettable, all at once progressive and nostalgic.

“To propel our Louisiana culture into the future seems to be quite a task, but if one lives for the music as Cedric does, the path seems effortless. These songs may well be early brushstrokes of a life’s worth of possibilities, not only for himself, but also for the identity survival of a culture.” -Michael Doucet

High Noon Saloon and Sugar Maple Music Festival present The Revelers
High Noon Saloon
Sunday, March 15 at 6:30 pm

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 which combines swamp-sop, Cajun, country, blues and zydeco into a powerful tonic of roots music that could only come from southwest Louisiana.

As individuals, they are each in high demand having performed and recorded with T-Bone Burnett, Natalie Merchant, Linda Ronstadt, Preston Frank, Walter Mouton, Mamadou Diabate, the Duhks, Cedric Watson, and Tim O’Brien, 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 they also were handpicked by David Simon (producer/creator, The Wire) to be featured musicians for the third and fourth seasons of HBO’s Tremé.

Long-time fans of the Red Stick Ramblers may find themselves very familiar with The Revelers: the powerful singing and songwriting of Chas Justus and Eric Frey, a mix of traditional Cajun and zydeco dance music, some of the swing that was such a strong focus of early RSR, the magical rhythm section chemistry of Glenn Fields and Eric Frey, and impressive musical virtuosity across the board.

Take what you know about the Red Sticks, add into the mix the crooning vocals of Glenn Fields, and the singing/songwriting of Blake Miller (founding member of the Pine Leaf Boys and unarguably the most prolific French songwriter coming out of Louisiana right now, the tightly arranged section of sax-fiddle-accordion, and you’ll start to get The Revelers’ picture.

The depth of this band has only developed from digging deeper into the dancehall traditions of Southwest Louisiana and emerging with an arsenal we call Louisiana Jukebox Music. Music critics are wont to categorize music into clear genre styles, but that’s not really the way folk traditions develop — things are passed around, the lines are blurred — and particularly in a culture as unique as that of SW Louisiana (we won’t use the old gumbo cliché, but you get the idea … ). The Revelers have embraced that musical truth in a way few bands have — the lines between traditional and original, Cajun, country, zydeco, swamp-pop, and the blues, are blurred, and wide-ranging styles are honed into an extremely cohesive performance.

The genre of swamp pop may bear some explanation. Little-known outside of Louisiana (but still quite popular in the region) it’s a music that’s nearly confined to the archives of the 50s and 60s, save for a handful of bands today. In short, 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 unstoppable sound reached Cajun and zydeco musicians, they caught the bug and played their own versions the only way they knew how — sometimes in French, and traded in their fiddles and accordions for horns and electric guitars. It’s a perfect example of how everything that comes from Acadiana is dripping with its own unique culture.

Get set to see and hear some of the world’s most accomplished musicians — and then grab your instrument and make music with them!

Scheduled jams kick-off Saturday with the bluegrass Bloody Mary jam at the Roots & Reasons stage. This year’s featured jam leaders include
Wood & Wire (bluegrass), Hubby Jenkins (old-time) and Jeffrey Broussard (Cajun). Don’t miss this opportunity!

Check out the jam tent schedule at
https://sugarmaplefest.org/2019-festival-schedule/

If you enjoyed the jam tents at the Sugar Maple Music Festival, then you don’t want to miss the Fall String Gathering!

A weekend of traditional, old-time, bluegrass, Irish, and Cajun music-sharing; organized by musicians, for musicians. Open to all skill levels and acoustic instruments.

Hosted at the Clarion Convention Center in Baraboo, WI, the gathering will feature impromptu jamming as well as several scheduled jams and a washtub bass workshop.

November 16-18, 2018

Friday 6 pm – Sunday 11 am

Friday 7:30 – 9:00 pm  Gypsy Jazz Jam – 4th floor

?Sat 10:00 – 11:30 am  – Slow/Half Speed Jam – 5th floor

Sat 1:00 – 2:30 pm   Irish Session – 4th floor?

Sat 2:00 – 3:00 pm Washtub Bass Workshop – 5th floor?

Sat 3:00 – 4:30 pm   Cajun Circle – 5th floor

The String Gathering provides an opportunity for bluegrass and old-time musicians across Wisconsin, its bordering states and beyond, to come together and celebrate their common love of music.

More information at String Gathering