Big Fun at the jazz festival!!!

[JRL]

Every year here in sacramento we have a huge Memorial Day jazz fesrival. For years it was the worlds biggest Dixieland jazz festival, but with the agibg and dying off of the Dixie demographic it's become much more diverse. First they let a country swing band and a Zydeco Band or 2, but now its a wide spectrum of American roots music.

It;s kind of a unique festival, I don't know how many are like this. There are a bunch of venues from small to neduim size, mostly down in tourist trap called Old Sacramento roughly 15 square blocks of shops, clubs, resturaunts and historic stuff. It's right on river too.
So the bands play multiple shows at different venues over the four days. Some band play as many as 10 shows or more. The musicians all get paid by the show, like $50 a set per guy. Possibly some headliners get more.

From my blog:Big fun at the Jazz Festival
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Now this is what I live for!!! A weekend totally devoted to music!!!!

Since I had musician and band companion badges, TJ and I spent a good part of Saturday at the fest in Old Sacramento. What an emmbaresment of riches our annual fest is!! We walked around, eating and looking at everything. After perusing the schedule we saw several great bands. First was Gator Beat, then we headed to Turntable Junction to hear our friends Johnny Guitar Knox and Dave Croal and their marvelous band The Soothers. Their set got a much deserved standing ovation. Blues at its best!!!! Then we went to the Railroad Museum and caught the end of the Sacramento Banjo Band's set. (TJ loves anything old timey, lucky for me. I'm pretty old timey)

After that it was back to Turntable Junction to hear the Zydeco Flames. Great band, r and b infused zydeco. We saw Igor the jazz cowboy and then another set by the banjo band.

The next day I played 3 shifts at the fest with The Bayou Boys.
//http://www.bayouband.com We still managed to catch some music: The Royal Society Jazz Orchestra, our friends Mumbo Gumbo(nice entrance Reggie!). The big thrill was seeing Billy Mata and Texas Tradition, a great Bob Wills style country swing group.

A great time was had by all!!!!