By Wendy Lemlin
Renowned BeauSoleil set to kick off Gator By the Bay Festival
Three-time Grammy-winning Cajun band BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet will headline the Gator By the Bay festival’s special kick-off concert, Thursday, May 7, at Spanish Landing Park, located on Harbor Drive across from San Diego International Airport.
Celebrating their 40th anniversary, the band has been called “the world’s greatest Cajun band” by Garrison Keillor, host of the iconic NPR radio show “A Prairie Home Companion,” on which BeauSoleil has appeared more times than band leader Michael Doucet can count.
“I think we have played on the show at least once per year since 1982,” he recalled. “And in the early days, it really opened the door for us and introduced our music to a whole new audience. We’ve been told that we have been on more shows than any other guest artists.”
In 1998, BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet became the first Cajun band ever to win a Grammy. They won two more in 2009 and 2010, and have garnered a total of 12 Grammy nominations.
Based in Lafayette, Louisiana — the epicenter of “Cajun Country” — the band has also won the Big Easy Entertainment Award, presented by the New Orleans music and entertainment publication Gambit Weekly 10 times for Best Cajun Band. They’ve also landed the Best Cajun Artist title 13 times in Offbeat Magazine’s Best of the Beat Awards. In a state where it seems there are as many Cajun bands as alligators in the bayous, that’s a really big deal.
Doucet has gained wide acclaim for developing his own flavor of Cajun music with the band. Early on, he focused on the lead and twin fiddle styles of the original Acadian folk music, over the more popular adoption of the German diatonic accordion as the lead instrument found in most Cajun bands today.
“When I started playing music, I never thought in terms of a band,” he said. “I learned from my uncle and the great fiddle players of our region. The fiddle was the oldest instrument in Cajun music, and the twin fiddles style was the one that spoke to me. So, when BeauSoleil began, that was the direction I took.
“Cajun music is not just one thing, it’s multi-faceted,” he added. “In fact, when I was growing up, you never heard the term ‘Cajun music,’ it was called Acadian, or even Evangeline, because of its birth in our centuries-old heritage as exiles from Nova Scotia and there it was always the fiddle that was first and foremost.”
The accordion eventually became the more widely used lead instrument on the Louisiana scene, BeauSoleil said, because it adapted better to the region’s humidity and other adverse weather conditions.
BeauSoleil’s powerful music is both deeply traditional and vibrantly futuristic. While the band’s repertoire includes hundreds of traditional Cajun and zydeco songs, BeauSoleil has also pushed past the purely traditional Louisiana folk music, incorporating elements of rock ‘n’ roll, jazz, blues, calypso, and other genres in both original compositions and reworkings of classic tunes.
“For us, it has always been a wide view of the music,” Doucet said. “Back in the ’70s when we started, the genre was considered ‘old people’s music.’ We worked to bring out the fun in the music, to introduce it in the schools and get young people involved.
“Now I guess we’re the old people,” the white-haired musician said, laughing. “But we’re still rocking, and Cajun music today is enjoying a huge multigenerational revival, with bands whose members are in their 20s, 30s and on up, drawing huge crowds, not just in Louisiana, but in concerts and festivals all over the country and even the world.”
BeauSoleil are no strangers to the San Diego area; in recent years they have played to packed audiences at the California Center for the Arts in Escondido, Poway Center for the Performing Arts, the now-defunct Anthology, and performed numerous times at the old Street Scene festival Downtown.
“I love playing in San Diego,” Doucet said enthusiastically. “The crowds are always appreciative, even if they are new to Cajun music.”
He said he also loves the diversity of San Diego’s restaurants and food, especially the authentic Mexican cuisine and never-ending supply of avocados.
“I’m really looking forward to playing at Gator By the Bay, which does so much to bring the Louisiana culture to Southern California,” he said. “Plus, one of the great things about San Diego is the weather and it’s always fun to be able to play outside, without the humidity or extremes of temperature we often experience in Louisiana.”
BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet consists of Michael Doucet on violin, accordion, mandolin, vocals and guitar; his brother David Doucet on guitar, ukelele, and vocals; Mitch Reed on fiddle and bass; Billy Ware on percussion; Tommy Alesi on drums; and Bill Bennett on bass and sound tech. To learn more about the band, visit beausoleilmusic.com.
Opening for BeauSoleil on May 7 are San Diego performers G Burns Jug Band and Sara Petite. Tickets for the seated concert (but, yes, there will be two dance floors!) range from $25-$95, and are available online or at the gate. Note: Tickets for BeauSoleil do not include access to the festival’s Friday, Saturday or Sunday activities unless you purchase a four-day festival ticket for $140.
Gator By the Bay, takes place May 7-10, and will include over 85 performances on five stages, featuring an eclectic mix of music including Cajun, zydeco, legendary blues, swing, Latin, rockabilly, and more. “All day” tickets, evening tickets, or two-, three-, and four-day tickets are available in advance online at a discounted rate, or at the gate. Children under 17 are free when accompanied by an adult.
The festival is presented by the City of San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture and the County of San Diego Community Enhancement program, and is also presented in part by the Louisiana Office of Tourism and their affiliate tourism bureaus. All festival and ticket information can be found at gatorbythebay.com.
—Wendy Lemlin is an award-winning San Diego-based freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].
