If you’re counting, which includes not counting the COVID years of 2020-2021, Blackpot is in its 16th year of presenting an eclectic collection of music and musicians not commonly heard in these parts.
Yes, there’ll be Cajun and zydeco and la la, as well as Old Time, blues, string band, Western swing, bluegrass, singer/songwriter, Tex-Mex, ragtime, country — music you can enjoy even if the power grid goes down.
And, yes, again, the square dance session is in its usual Saturday morning slot at 11 a.m. with The Faux Paws with Nancy Spero calling.
Then there’s the camping.
Where there’s grass, there are tents…
Coupled with a wide-ranging line-up, the option to camp on festival grounds and partake in or simply enjoy pop-up jams (day & night and the wee hours), also sets BlackPot Festival & Cook-Off apart from other festivals in the area.
…and where there are tents, jam sessions break out all over the Blackpot campground all day and all night.
Another divergent particular at Blackpot is the costume contest set for 10 p.m. Saturday night at the Main Stage, between Los Texmaniacs and The Revelers. And why not? After all, Halloween is just two days away.
In the meantime, Blackpot Camp is underway at Lakeview Park & Beach, 1717 Veterans Memorial Hwy., Eunice. There are musical instrument and music style classes underway through Thursday, covering Cajun fiddle, guitar and accordion; Western Swing, Old Time, harmony vocals, rhythm, drums, and dance.
Coming Wednesday, it’s Bruce Daigrepont, the Honky Tonk All-Stars; and Thursday, it’s Preston Frank, followed by Cajun music.
Blackpot Fest
The Blackpot Festival itself gets started 6 Friday evening with, well, options across three stages. The Fraulines open the Main Stage; a Cajun jam with the Daiquiri Queens takes place at the Chapel Stage; and Renée Reed performs at the Schoolhouse Stage.
Come Saturday, Jesse Lege starts the day-long music extravaganza with a Cajun jam at 10 a.m. Square dancing begins an hour later and then an hour after that, all music breaks loose.
Square dancing – complete with instruction and plenty of beginners – gets the juices flowing at 11 a.m. Saturday.
One of the many bands on the schedule is Lafayette’s Major Handy who will hit the Chapel Stage, Saturday, 6-7 p.m. While only Handy’s name is listed, do know the set will include his band, Major Handy & the Louisiana Blues Band.
“We’re going to have the whole band,” said Handy.
Major Handy and friend. Robin May photo
The band consists of Carmen Jacob, drums; Ramsey Robinson, guitar; Lincoln Landry, bass/vocals; and Handy, accordion/vocals.
And if you’re wondering what you’ll hear, well, here ya go:
“I’m going to be doing Major Handy, bro,” Handy chuckled. “You know, rhythm & blues and jazz and, I don’t know, maybe there’ll be zydeco.”
You can also expect a few of Handy’s tunes with Come On Home, Zydeco Feeling and Trailside.
Handy, steadily gigging after the pandemic, is also recovering rather well from a stroke in January 2020. Handy said he’s doing “Pretty good. I just got a little limp that aggravates me every now and then,” he said. “But, you know what? It’s leaving.
“It’s all but over,” continued Handy. “It’s not that bad. Every time I go to therapy, I come back a little bit better and stronger.”
While there will be food and beverages about, one would be remiss not to mention the Cook-Off. It is an integral part of the festival. Heck, it’s in the event’s name: Blackpot Festival & Cook-Off.
John Vidrine check on his chance at a prize while onlookers check on John Vidrine.
The cook-off takes place Saturday afternoon. Folks can visit each chef’s outdoor kitchen and sample their creations.
Anyone can enter from amateur to professional for a chance at prizes and bragging rights. Categories include Gravy, Gumbo, Cracklins, Jambalaya, dessert.
Entry fees are $75 for individuals; Civic organizations, $100; and Business, $125. Go here for more info.
BLACKPOT TICKET INFO Weekend pass includes camping, $70; Friday night, 6 p.m.-midnight (no camping), $30; Saturday noon-midnight (no camping) $40.
OPELOUSAS (BHP) – Clifton Chenier, the Grammy-winning King of Zydeco, has a day named in his honor. On May 25, the Louisiana House of Representatives adopted a resolution that proclaims June 25, from 2021 through 2025, as Clifton Chenier Day. Chenier, a multiple-Grammy honoree, was born June 25, 1925 near Opelousas. 2025 marks the 100th anniversary of Chenier’s birth. Chenier died December 12, 1987. Honoring that landmark date is the purpose of the newly-formed Clifton Chenier Centennial Committee, which submitted the resolution to Rep. Dustin Miller (D-Opelousas). Introduced as House Resolution 129, the designation was read by title and passed by the House. The resolution heralds Chenier and his Red Hot Louisiana Band for “extraordinary musical accomplishments” and creation of a “distinct musical style not only for the state of Louisiana but for the world…” Chenier’s accomplishments include a 1983 Grammy for his “I’m Here” album, 1984 National Heritage Fellowship, 2011 induction into the Grammy Hall of Fame for the “Bogalusa Boogie” album and 2014 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. “Clifton Chenier is one of the most decorated musicians to come out of the state of Louisiana,” said Herman Fuselier, executive director of the St. Landry Parish Tourist Commission. “Countless musicians, from today’s zydeco players to Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones, have claimed Chenier as a major influence. The music world changed the day Clifton picked up an accordion.” “Clifton Chenier has played such a critical role in the development of zydeco music as well has also helped to shape the history of our area,” said Melanie Lebouef, city of Opelousas tourism director. “Because of this, it is important to properly honor his legacy and contributions.” The Centennial Committee began meeting in January to discuss potential projects and activities related to the 100th anniversary of the late Chenier’s birth. Members include Herman Fuselier executive director of the St. Landry Parish Tourist Commission; Melanie Lebouef director of the City of Opelousas Tourism; Rod Sias and Lola Love of the Zydeco Historical and Preservation Society; Patrick Guillory of the Original Southwest Louisiana Zydeco Music Festival; Paul Scott zydeco music enthusiast; Felicia Chenier of Morgan State University and Chenier’s granddaughter; and Tracey Antee, founder of Gumbo Life. The Chenier resolution is also scheduled on the June meeting agendas of the St. Landry Parish Council and Opelousas City Council. The mission of the Clifton Chenier Centennial Celebration is to honor the 100th anniversary of the birth of zydeco trailblazer Clifton Chenier, an Opelousas native, through special projects and activities.
When Rod Bernard died this month, swamp pop music lost a pioneer and Shane K. Bernard lost a father.
Bernard, who died July 12, 2020, was 79.
For me, as a journalist, one of the biggest drags of the occupation is to interview the friends, and, especially, family members of someone who has died. I’ve always been uncomfortable with such an assignment; they’ve always made me feel like an interloper.
So when I hadn’t heard back from Shane K. Bernard after a few days, I was quietly relieved. Still, I was content to talk to others about his father and had enough for a story.
And then he returned the call.
Bernard apologized and said he had been dealing with the details and such related to his father’s passing. For me, it is totally understandable and no apology necessary.
In the process of our conversation, Bernard began talking about his father’s death, and I mean the moment thereof, and I felt he needn’t recall the ordeal; I didn’t want to put him through it again.
According to Shane Bernard, Rod Bernard worked in radio and television for his entire life. He landed his first radio program on KSLO around age 10, and for many years in the 1960s he deejayed, sold airtime, and served as a program director at KVOL radio in Lafayette.
However, Bernard, historian and curator to McIlhenny Company and Avery Island, Inc., and author of several books, including Swamp Pop: Cajun and Creole Rhythm and Blues (University Press of Mississippi), saw it differently.
In an email after the interview, Bernard wrote: “By the way, I didn’t mind telling you about Dad’s final moments: the point of it was, he was fine one minute, walking around the house, and then short of breath the next. Within a minute or so he lost consciousness and never re-woke. He did not suffer, and went quickly.
“I wouldn’t mind if his fans knew that, as I know it might give them some relief to know it was not a bad ending to his life.”
Rod Bernard’s death is not at all related to the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic.
“He’d been having trouble in recent months with his vocal cords just as far as speaking,” said Shane Bernard. “He didn’t speak above a loud whisper, if that’s such a thing. But he had good days and bad days.”
Bernard noted that his father’s last public performance was in 2015 at the Ponderosa Stomp, an American roots music festival. “And he was supposed to sing, as I remember, three songs. But he ran out of breath into the second song and managed to finish it.
Rod Bernard at the Ponderosa Stomp, October 2, 2015. Guitarist Charles Adcock in the background. Gene Tomko, photo
“But he couldn’t sing the third song,” said Bernard. “So he kind of gave up singing at that point.”
It would be the last time Rod Bernard would perform in public. However, it wasn’t the first time he’d stopped singing.
It was 1975 and “dad was still, you know, flirting with the idea of becoming a big star and he’d thought about moving to Nashville and that sort of thing,” said Shane Bernard.
In the meantime, Rod Bernard had a career going at KLFY-TV 10 that would go on for 30 years. He was an advertising executive and on-air talent, including the host of Saturday Hop, a teen dance program that once featured Little Richard with Jimi Hendrix in tow.
Rod Bernard and the Twisters.
The Bernards lived in Lafayette. A friend and neighbor was a Lafayette native who would move to Nashville and make a name for himself as a country music singer and songwriter.
Bernard said his father asked his friend to write him a song.
“My dad said, ‘If you could write me a hit song, I think that if I recorded it, it would restart my music career just because of the small amount of name recognition I already have from 1959,’” said Bernard, referring to the song “This Should Go On Forever” that put the local singer on Dick Clark’s TV program, American Bandstand.
The songwriter had written song that he believed to be a hit and gave it to his friend.
Rod Bernard recorded the song.
However, a session musician at the time, said Shane Bernard, also liked the song and wanted to record it himself.
This person, Bernard said, asked the recording engineer for a copy of the master tape and re-cut the song with his own band. He got the song leased to a major label “and it became a national hit,” said Bernard. “And, he released it before dad’s version.
“That’s not illegal, but it was highly unethical,” said Bernard. As a result, it managed to put an end to his father’s aspirations to go big time. “I noticed, all of a sudden, music wasn’t fun anymore after that.
“He did it for money, playing on the weekend, but he really didn’t enjoy it anymore,” the son said. “I never even really ever heard him listening to music all that much.”
About a decade later, Oscar “Ric” Bernard, who’d played lead guitar and bass in his brother Rod’s band, exacted a small measure of revenge on the singer who absconded with his brother’s song.
Oscar Bernard graduated as a physics major from University of Southwestern Louisiana and went to work for Boeing “and was subcontracted to NASA on the Apollo missions,” said Shane Bernard. “He’s just a brilliant guy.”
“I asked him for music lessons one time when I was in high school. I just wanted to learn how to play ‘Smoke on the Water,’” Bernard recalled. What he got instead was a lesson in music theory. “We never touched the guitar.”
Dick Clark, left, interviews Rod Bernard about his Top 20 hit, “This Should Go On Forever,” on Dick Clark’s American Bandstand in 1959.
After Oscar Bernard left aerospace, he worked as a petroleum engineer and lived in Houston.
As it happened, Uncle Oscar was tooling around in his car and came upon a honky tonk with a familiar name on its marquee.
“It’s the guy who stole the song,” said Shane Bernard. “So Oscar stops and he goes in. And in-between songs, Oscar goes up to the guy.” He asked the singer if he recorded the song in question.
The singer was thrilled that he was remembered for the song.
“And Uncle Oscar says, ‘Well, I’m Rod Bernard’s brother.’ And the guy goes, ‘Aw, man. I’m so sorry about what happened,’” said Benard. “And then my uncle said, ‘Your mom must be proud of you.’ And then he walked out.”
Just prior to the unethical incident, the swamp pop crooner and the King of Zydeco, Clifton Chenier, got together to record “Boogie in Black & White,” a 10-song album with R&B, rock and roll and blues.
At the time of the 1976 recording, Chenier was in-between contracts, “So dad said, ‘Hey, man, while you’re free, could we do an album together because I’ve always wanted to do that because you’re one of my heroes,’” Bernard said. “They both grew up in Opelousas and they knew each other.”
Rod Bernard had a novel approach to the recording.
“Then dad says, ‘Let’s not even really rehearse. Let’s just get together and jam and we’ll do the cuts live. We won’t worry about messing up or anything.’ So that’s what happened.”
“If you notice,” he said. “There’s not zydeco or swamp pop. They’re sort of blues, ’50’s R&B recordings.”
The songs include “Kansas City,” “My Babe,” “Shake, Rattle & Roll,” “Baby, What You Want Me to Do?” and “My Babe,” and may well have been selected by Rod Bernard.
Shane Bernard said he found a song list the elder Bernard wrote in a notebook.
“So it looks like he was putting together a track listing of things he wanted to record,” said Bernard. “And he even wrote the lyrics down and the key of the song and everything. So that’s why I think he chose the tracks.”
In it’s own way, the album, recorded live over two-nights in Ville Platte for Floyd Soileau’s Jin label, was more than songs on vinyl, it was also a statement about race relations.
Music writer Michael Tisserand wrote: “The title of their project made it clear that the musicians had succeeded in crossing the color barrier.”
Zydeco and swamp pop legends got together, yet neither genre made the 1976 album.
And the racial make-up of the musicians on the album seem to back that up with Rod Bernard, vocals; Clifton Chenier, vocals/accordion; Warren Storm, drums; Cleveland Chenier, scrub board; Glenn Himel, piano; James Stelly, guitar; Joe Hill, bass; and John Hart, sax.
In his tribute to Bernard on the commission’s website blog, Herman Fuselier, music writer and executive director of the St. Landry Tourist Commission, also made note of the collaboration.
“The title raised some eyebrows as public schools had just been integrated six years earlier,” Fuselier wrote. Read more here.
While the originators of the swamp pop are aging (yet, some still recording, such as Tommy McClain with Warren Storm on drums) and, sadly, even dying (such as Huey “Cookie” Thierry, Lil’ Alfred, Clint West and Bobby Charles), what does the future portend for the genre?
“Actually, I find swamp pop to be in much better shape now than when I wrote my book (‘Swamp Pop,’ 1996). It seemed a lot closer to dying out back then,” said Bernard. “My wife is a big swamp pop fan and so are her parents. They’re from down around Franklin.”
Bernard said the Franklin area and Morgan City and “on the east side of the Atchafalaya, people are swamp pop nuts. Even today,” he said. “I can’t even explain it because, from my research, swamp pop seems to be born and developed primarily on the west side of the Atchafalaya and even as far west as East Texas.
“If I had to pinpoint an area where swamp pop came from, I would say it was around Opelousas, Eunice, that area,” Bernard continued. “That’s kind of borne out by Earl King who said that he first heard that sound in the Eunice area.”
Swamp pop gigs were regular at night clubs and dancehalls in the region and thereabouts, such as the Southern Club, the Green Lantern and the Step-In.
“Now, swamp pop is really big on the other side of the Atchafalaya while it’s not so big here anymore,” said Bernard, adding that a number of radio stations from Morgan City and eastward “play a huge amount of swamp pop.
“They have a lot of swamp pop concerts, a lot of swamp pop shows at night clubs, and you’ve got this younger generation (Ryan Foret & Foret Tradition) that came along,” he said. “And there are other second and third generation swamp pop bands that are very popular and very active from Morgan City east to the New Orleans area.”
While it has been some 45 years since Rod Bernard’s interest in music had waned, that all changed, and, not too long ago.
“He did start again, recently, because my son, who’s 15, is becoming a pretty good guitarist,” Bernard said. “So he and my dad would shut themselves up in a room at my house and listen to the blues and rhythm & blues from the ’50s, early ’60’s.
“It was basically my dad introducing my son to music that my dad really liked.”
As we know, Rod Bernard died July 12, 2020. He was 79.
Bernard’s claim to fame on a nationwide scale came as a teenager in 1959 when Rod Bernard & the Twisters performed “This Should Go On Forever” on Dick Clark’s American Bandstand.
“Rod was an icon back when he first came out with a local string of hits and then ‘This Should Go On Forever’ went national,” said Barry Ancelet, Cajun folklorist and expert in Cajun music and Cajun French. “And when he sang on American Bandstand, a lot of people here said, ‘Hey, look what one of us did.’
“He shared his accomplishment with everybody. We all felt like we’d been on American Bandstand,” he said. “He never put on airs or got aloof or anything.”
Ancelet, longtime host of “Rendez-vous des Cajuns” a Cajun music radio and TV show broadcast from the Liberty Theatre in Eunice, recalled a Bernard performance there.
“We had him at the Liberty one Saturday night,” Ancelet said. “I swear when he started singing that song, it brought me back to my youth and carried a whole theater of people back to the 60s.
“When he talked, he had a rasp in his voice. And then he’d start singing, he didn’t need a microphone. He filled up the whole theater with this big, ol’ huge baritone voice. Amazing.”
Bernard, along with Warren Storm, Johnnie Allan, Skip Stewart, Clint West, all known for swamp pop, recorded in French.
“In fact, Clint West and Rod Bernard and Warren Storm and Johnnie Allan, they all recorded stuff in French, too,” said Ancelet. “It’s awesome stuff. They realized that culture’s got to grow, it’s got to experiment, it’s got to try new stuff.
“And some of it’s going to work,” he said. “If you don’t try, you don’t know. They produced some really great stuff.”
Swamp pop came on the scene just after rock and roll cranked up, and, of course, Louisiana had a hand in it with the likes of Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis.
“So rock and roll was in the air, at the very beginning, even proto-rock and roll was in the air,” said Ancelet. “So, you know, it was a natural thing for these kids to play with that. They were young, they were various, they were adventurous, they were experimental. The were looking for something new and they were having a blast doing this stuff.
“And they were good at it, man. Seriously,” he said. “They were really good at it.”
Ancelet’s maternal grandparents managed Rocket Beach Swimming Hole between Lafayette and Opelousas of I-49. Bernard, Skip Stewart and Warren Storm, as The Shondells, would play there.
“The people who left the Rocket Beach after listening to the Fabulous Shondells, their belt buckles were shining,” said Ancelet. “They didn’t need to turn on their headlights.”
Warren Storm D.Cross photo
Storm recalled when the Shondells became a band in 1963. Storm was working in the print shop for the City of Lafayette when Bernard and Stewart approached him with an idea.
“Everybody had their own group,” said Storm, recalling a conversation that went something like “‘Why don’t we put a band together and have three singers.’ So that’s when we decided to do that. It was a heckuva thing. We kept busy for seven straight years, six nights a week, sometimes seven; twice on Sundays.
“We had a blast for seven years,” he said, including a standing gig at Opelousas’ Southern Club for those seven years. The singers took turns at the mic. “We each do 20 minutes or a half-hour. “We played all over Louisiana and east Texas,” said Storm. “We had a blast, man.”
The band’s run came to an end when Bernard’s day job demanded more of his attention.
“Everybody had a day gig,” said Storm. While Bernard stopped performing, “me and Skip kept on a couple of years after that. And then I got my own group again.”
According to his son, Shane K. Bernard, his father “worked in radio and television for his entire life. He landed his first radio program on KSLO around age 10, and for many years in the 1960s he deejayed, sold airtime, and served as a program director at KVOL radio in Lafayette. (Bernard was instrumental in hiring Lafayette’s first African-American deejay, Paul Thibeaux, who joined KVOL in 1965.)”
Herman Fuselier, music writer and executive director of the St. Landry Tourist Commission, noted in his tribute to Bernard on the commission’s website blog, that Bernard and Clifton Chenier teamed-up for their “Boogie in Black & White” recording in 1976.
“The title raised some eyebrows as public schools had just been integrated six years earlier,” Fuselier wrote. “But Bernard, Chenier and a sizzling band of black and white musicians raced through R&B and blues classics.”
That would be songs like “My Babe,” “Rockin’ Pneumonia and Boogie Woogie Flu,’ along with the Cajun waltz, ‘My Jolie Blonde.”
Shane Bernard said in 1970, his father “switched to a career in television and for nearly 30 years worked as an advertising executive and on-air talent for Lafayette’s KLFY-TV 10 (for whom he had previously hosted his Saturday Hop live dance program). For decades he appeared in television commercials and often guest-hosted the channel’s long-popular Passe Partout and Meet Your Neighbor programs. He retired in 2018 from the Acadiana Broadcasting Group.”
But back in his performing days, Rod Bernard released “many regional hits that became swamp pop classics,” according to Shane Bernard. That would include “Congratulations To You Darling,” “Forgive,” “Loneliness,” “Fais Do-Do,” and his own bilingual version of the Cajun classic “Colinda.”
The swamp pop musician/broadcaster passed after a short illness. His family asks that donations be made to the U.S. Marines’ Toys for Tots campaign at www.toysfortots.org. At his request no funeral will be observed.
Various Artists Dedans le Sud de la Louisiane Frémeaux & Associés
If you missed this landmark 1972 Cajun-Creole cultural documentary by French filmmaker Jean-Pierre Bruneau, you’re in luck. Its recent DVD reissue now includes the equally indispensable out-of-print CD Les Haricots sont pas Salés 27 live recordings from the same expedition.
Considering that cultural icons Dewey Balfa, Nathan Abshire, Clifton Chenier, Canray Fontenot, “Bois Sec” Ardoin and Dennis McGee were still in their prime performing their signature songs, 45 years (2017) seems like a galaxy from the world Bruneau initially rolled onto film.
The uninitiated and the seasoned alike will find it informative. There’s a French-spoken/English subtitled historical narration of the Grand Derangement as well as an explanation of how Mardi Gras has roots in the fifth-century English Shrove Tuesday tradition.
Academia aside, the scenes are priceless. In an austere Mamou studio where a confederate flag hangs on a wall between a pitchfork and a scythe, Nathan Abshire swings his accordion madly side to side for the coup de gras finale of “Pine Grove Blues.” On “Les barres de la prison,” Creole fiddler Canray Fontenot gives an intense performance accompanied by accordionist ‘Bois Sec’ Ardoin and ace rhythm guitarist Rodney Balfa.
Not only does Rodney’s brother/fiddler Dewey Balfa appear in several scenes, he also conducts an insightful interview with Creole accordionist Bee Fontenot, highlighting the difference between Cajun and Creole/zydeco music.
The accompanying CD is not a track-by-track verbatim representation of the film but features an additional 20 songs not included on the DVD. Together the DVD-CD package consummates the picture Bruneau initially began and is essential for the Cajun-Creole curious.
GRAND COTEAU (DC) – Lil’ Buck Sinegal, and his band alone, sans Major Handy, will play the Mardi Gras move, Saturday, Jan. 27, Knights of Peter Claver Hall, with a Mardi Gras Dance.
Bayou Hack Press published Jan. 9 that Major Handy was part of the program. BHP has since learned differently and updated the story accordingly.
Although Handy is undergoing heart surgery Jan. 18 (story coming soon), it was news to him he was playing when contacted by BHP for comment on the dance. Overall, no harm, no foul.
Showtime is 9 p.m., and of course you can expect blues, funk, zydeco and everything else you know that Buck knows and plays.
Knights of Peter Claver Hall is located at 252 Church Street – same campus with the Thensted Center. Tickets are $10 in advance/$12 at the door.
Lil’ Buck Sinegal is a phenomenal guitarist with a career that spans more than five decades. With more than 300 recordings under his belt, Buck has played and recorded with Clifton Chenier, Henry Gray, Rockin’ Dopsie, Buckwheat Zydeco, and other blues artists, including Grammy-winning efforts with Paul Simon’s 1987 album “Graceland.”
Buck also worked as a session guitarist for Excello on swamp blues by Slim Harpo and Lazy Lester. Buck was inducted into the Louisiana Blues Hall of Fame in 1999.
There will be a pageant with the king and queen, a Second Line, and a raffle with great prizes.
And you know there will be food and beverages for sale.
Tickets are $10 in advance/$12 at the door. All proceeds will help with renovation of the historic Knights of Peter Claver Hall.
Tickets available now by calling Renella Henry at 337-349-5814 or at P & D Cake Cottage, 106 St. Joseph St., Grand Coteau.
All donations are tax-exempt and highly appreciated.
