New Orleans jazz thrilled the world in the twenties and traveled around the world in the thirties. In the forties and fifties, the world came to New Orleans to hear authentic New Orleans jazz played by real jazz musicians. The sixties brought Preservation Hall, a musical institution that even a hurricane couldn't kill. For the last 40 years, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival has been celebrating New Orleans' and Louisiana's unique culture and music. This volume contains rare photographs from the Louisiana State Museum's Jazz Collection, lovingly assembled and accompanied by captions written by award-winning author and Jazz Roots radio show host Tom Morgan. Those who love jazz will be amazed by these pictures of some of the best musicians ever to pick up an instrument. For those just beginning to learn about jazz, this 200-page volume is an excellent takeoff point to learn more about what made New Orleans jazz unique, and a source to discover musicians who can further enhance readers' listening pleasure.

Birthplace of jazz, home to the beignet, city of a thousand legends, New Orleans grew out of a unique blend of cultures. Its architecture and cuisine, born of Spanish, French, Caribbean, African and other influences, created a city unlike any other in America. Its popular saying, laissez les bons temps rouler—let the good times roll—reflects the upbeat spirit of its citizens, a spirit that has at times been diminished by tragedy, but that can never be vanquished. Historic Photos of New Orleans celebrates that spirit in nearly 200 striking, black-and-white photographs selected from local and national archives. Here are the grand buildings and the immigrant slums, the cast-iron corn fences and the open-air markets, Mardi Gras parades and scenes of daily life. From the French Quarter and the elegant Garden District to the infamous Storyville, the people and places of New Orleans tell their unique story through these beautiful, rarely seen images.

New Orleans jazz thrilled the world in the twenties and traveled around the world in the thirties. In the forties and fifties, the world came to New Orleans to hear authentic New Orleans jazz played by real jazz musicians. The sixties brought Preservation Hall, a musical institution that even a hurricane couldn’t kill. For the last 40 years, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival has been celebrating New Orleans’ and Louisiana’s unique culture and music. This volume contains rare photographs from the Louisiana State Museum’s Jazz Collection, lovingly assembled and accompanied by captions written by award-winning author and Jazz Roots radio show host Tom Morgan. Those who love jazz will be amazed by these pictures of some of the best musicians ever to pick up an instrument. For those just beginning to learn about jazz, this 200-page volume is an excellent takeoff point to learn more about what made New Orleans jazz unique, and a source to discover musicians who can further enhance readers’ listening pleasure.

Days before the tumultuous presidential election of 1868, St. Bernard Parish descended into chaos. As African American men gained the right to vote, white Democrats of the parish feared losing their majority. Armed groups mobilized to suppress these recently emancipated voters in the hopes of regaining a way of life turned upside down by the Civil War and Reconstruction. Freedpeople were dragged from their homes and murdered in cold blood. Many fled to the cane fields to hide from their attackers. The reported number of those killed varies from 35 to 135. The tragedy was hidden, but implications reverberated throughout the South and lingered for generations. Author and historian Chris Dier reveals the horrifying true story behind the St. Bernard Parish Massacre.

New Orleans is not a typical Southern city. The Jews who have settled in New Orleans from 1757 to the present have had a very different experience than others in the South. New Orleans was a wide-open frontier that attracted gamblers, sailors, con artists, planters, and merchants. Most early Jewish immigrants were bachelors who took Catholic wives, if they married at all. The first congregation, Gates of Mercy, was founded in 1827, and by 1860, four congregations represented Sephardic, French and German, and Polish Jewry. The reform movement, the largest denomination today, took hold after the Civil War with the founding of Temple Sinai. Small as it is in proportion to the population of New Orleans, the Jewish community has made contributions that far exceed their numbers in cultural, educational, and philanthropic gifts to the city.

The first full-length book of drone photography of the Crescent City, Above New Orleans offers readers perspectives never before captured by a camera. Overhead scenes cover the entire metropolis, from the French Quarter to Uptown, from the Mississippi River to Lake Pontchartrain, from Westwego to New Orleans East, and from Gentilly to Gretna. A detailed description accompanies each image, providing insight into the history, geography, and architecture of this dazzling municipality. As this volume demonstrates, the vantage points afforded by the drone-mounted camera reveal fascinating views otherwise unobtainable in the often compact environment of New Orleans. “To me a roofscape is the tout ensemble of urban elements,” writes Richard Campanella in the book’s preface, “particularly in dense neighborhoods, visible from a perch that is high enough to be synoptical, yet low enough to be intimate. Roofscapes are the intermediary between the more familiar concepts of streetscapes and landscapes; they are the oblique, three-dimensional renderings of cityscapes.” Capturing these views of New Orleans required the specialized equipment and expertise of retired Italian engineer Marco Rasi, who has mastered the new technology of drone photography in his adopted hometown. His adept piloting and keen eye made for, in Rasi’s words, “the perfect platform to capture those rooftop perspectives I had always savored, as no aircraft or helicopter could ever do.” Above New Orleans: Roofscapes of the Crescent City beautifully documents the aesthetic wonder of the city’s singular urban landscape.