Magazine

Only blues music is more emblematic of the black experience in America than is jazz. Walter Dean Myers explains in his introduction to JAZZ that it was the fusion of black musical styles like the blues with white musical traditions that led to the birth of the new form, jazz. It is truly American music.

A Baton Rouge native, who is a major artistic voice of jazz in the U.S., has come home and wants to add energy to the existing arts agencies in the community.

Never write off New Orleans, especially on a rainy, winter weekend. During a recent getaway, we found warmth and hospitality with plenty of spirit. While not blind to the numerous problems created by Hurricane Katrina, we were aware that the town still offers plenty of magic for visitors.

In England, until 1858, the Prerogative Court of Canterbury had jurisdiction over all wills submitted for probate on behalf of English citizens who were temporary or permanent inhabitants of North America. Altogether there are more than 2,000 such wills among the one million wills registered in the PCC, and their existence has ensured that all persons mentioned in the wills have not only found a permanent place in historical records but have a provable link to English ancestry. The Advocate Magazine section Way to Go feature spotlights photographs of Louisiana residents taken on their travels this past year in the United States and abroad.

The photos must contain the travelers and a landmark that shows the travel destination or activity (such as climbing the Eiffel Tower or surfing in Hawaii) or a distinctive person met on a trip. Secretary of State Jay Dardenne did something rather spectacular for art lovers recently. He announced free admission to the museums under his jurisdiction.

Two performances of intense Flamenco dancing presenting Flamenco idol Carlota Santana, will be staged Sunday, Feb. 25, at the Manship Theatre, 100 Lafayette St. Arriving in time for Presidents Day is a new visitors guide from Lincoln City, Ind.

No one who was a slave in the American South is still living. Yet the words of slaves will be heard again at Magnolia Mound Plantation today. There is a calendar out now that needs to be in every major Louisiana collection.

It is the Alexander Historical and Genealogical Library and Museum Centennial Celebration Calendar, 1907-2007, and it is filled with the history and genealogy of this area. Fifteen-year-old Amari has a happy life in Ziavi, her village in remote Africa. She enjoys the foods her mother prepares, the tender teasing of her father, the companionship of her little brother, Kwasi, who is 8.

Amari is engaged to the handsome Besa and will be married soon. L’Applause, the Louisiana Black Film Festival, opens a poster exhibition and a film series honoring people of color in cinema and theatre to celebrate Black History Month 2007 throughout February. Cajun/Creole dishes and hot jazz and zydeco can now be found coast to coast, but Louisiana’s biggest cultural export may be Mardi Gras.

The zany festival with New Orleans roots has spread well beyond the state’s borders. An exhibition, An Unnatural Metropolis: Wresting New Orleans from Nature, based on the book by Craig E. Colten, opens Monday, Feb.

5, at the Hill Memorial Library on the LSU campus. “Almost every black person in Louisiana has lived in a shotgun house at one time or another,” Edna Jordan Smith claims. For many years, Smith worked in the genealogy section of the East Baton Rouge Parish Library Bluebonnet Regional Branch.

Southside Virginia Genealogies is a compilation of several hundred family histories, each of which, typically, extends back to the colonial period in Southside Virginia.