Kermit Ruffins
The 44-year-old New Orleans native lives it, plays it and sings about it, and nowhere is it more evident than when he discusses his craft… the swinging, good-time jazz that lured him in as a teenager and continues to whet his appetite even three decades and 10 solo recordings later.
Ruffins legacy-in-progress includes co-founding the Rebirth Brass Band in 1983. Rebirths creation was inspired by The Dirty Dozen Brass Band which was credited with bringing influences of funk and contemporary bebop into New Orleans style brass bands.
Big Sam’s Funky Nation is a driving force of urban funk. Ryan White, of the Oregonian, says the band is “tight enough (and hot enough) to turn coal into a diamond!” The band is led by trombone powerhouse, Big Sam Williams, formerly the trombonist for the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, who the San Francisco Chronicle calls “the top man on the slide trombone in the birthplace of jazz.”