Mardi Gras at Ashkenaz. Photo courtesy of Julia Scott-Jackson.
Thanks to Julia Scott-Jackson (right) for this photo from Mardi Gras night at Askkenaz Music & Community Dance Center in Berkeley. In the center is Charles Barnes, who was born in Louisiana and later moved to California. On the left is Theresa Fross. Playing were the Tri Tip Trio—whose music is “based on Clifton and Cleveland Chenier’s early zydeco/blues dance hall sounds“—and The Aux Cajunals, who focus on “the old-time acoustic sounds that can be heard in the earliest Cajun recordings of the 1920s.” Aux Cajunals members Eric & Suzy Thompson were some of the earliest non-Louisianans in California to discover and play the music during the folk revival.
