Serious music lovers in New Orleans have long considered Frenchmen Street the authentic alternative to Bourbon Street's tourist-oriented spectacle — a three-block stretch of bars and music clubs in the Faubourg Marigny where New Orleans musicians play for audiences who came specifically to listen. On any given night, you might move between a traditional jazz band at the Spotted Cat, a funk outfit at the Maison, a Afro-Cuban ensemble at d.b.a., and a brass band that has simply set up on the sidewalk between the clubs, drawing its own crowd of dancers in the street. The music on Frenchmen Street reflects the extraordinary breadth and depth of New Orleans musical culture: this is a city that has produced traditional jazz, bebop, R&B, funk, bounce, gospel, Cajun, zydeco, and classical, often in the same neighborhood and sometimes in the same family.
The street also hosts the Frenchmen Street Art Market on weekend nights, with local artists selling prints, paintings, and crafts from a cluster of covered tables near the clubs. The bars are small, the drinks are inexpensive by American standards, and the music is constant. This is where musicians play for musicians and where the line between performer and audience dissolves most completely.
Come after ten on a Friday or Saturday and stay until two. This is what a living musical city looks like.