The year before the flood

Description:

Spending 2004–2005 in New Orleans investigating the city’s legendary past both in the archives and its living culture in the street, this account combines personal memoir, historical research, and on-the-ground reporting to trace a suspenseful arc through the last year New Orleans was whole. The perspectives of daily life and the passage of seasons in the antediluvian city are darkly comic, irreverent, passionate, and angry. Fully revealing the city’s vicious heritage of racism and its murderous poverty, this heartbreaking narrative of joy, violence, and loss features a grand parade of unforgettable characters in the town that is both America’s great music city and its homicide capital.

subjects: Music,  History,  Political aspects of Music,  Popular music,  Musicology,  History and criticism,  Musicians,  Social conditions,  Social aspects of Music,  Biography & Autobiography,  Nonfiction,  Popular music, history and criticism,  Musicians, united states,  Music, social aspects,  New orleans (la.), history,  New orleans (la.), social conditions,  Musique populaire,  Histoire et critique,  Musicologie,  Musiciens,  Musique,  Aspect social,  Histoire,  Aspect politique,  Political aspects,  Social aspects,  Jazz

Places: New Orleans,  Louisiana,  New Orleans (La.)