Every memory in the archive
Browse the full archive of Zydeco music and Louisiana & Texas Creole culture, filtered by category.
Carlton Frank, one of the last of the old-time Creole fiddlers, died February 5, 2005, at the age of 74 at a hospital in Jennings, Louisiana. His music lives on through his recordings. In 2001, Keith...
Southern Soul & Blues singer Jacqueline "Jazzy Jackie" Neal was murdered by her ex-boyfriend James White on March 10, 2005 in the "T-Nails" beauty salon on Florida Boulevard in Baton Rouge, Louisiana....
Mark Matthews, the oldest surviving Buffalo Soldier in the United States Army, died on September 6, 2005 age of 111. While working at a racetrack in Kentucky, he met several Buffalo Soldiers, and when...
Earl Rodney Jones, legendary radio personality, DJ, and Bluseologist, died on Friday, January 2, 2004 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana of lung cancer at the age of 75. E. Rodney Jones was born on August 8, 1...
Southern Soul and Blues singer Isaac “Big Ike” Martin died on August 31, 2003 from complications from a gastric bypass operation in his hometown of Lake Charles, Louisiana. Big Ike became lead singer...
Blues Legend Charles Mose Brown died of heart failure on January 21, 1999 at the age of 76 in Oakland, California. Mr. Charles Brown was a major musical figure in the pre-rock and roll era of the late...
Andrus Espreé, known to the Zydeco Nation as Beau Jocque (which means Big Guy), died of a heart attack in Kinder, Louisiana on September 10, 1999, at the age of 47. Lead singer of the Zydeco group Bea...
Blues pianist Albert "Sunnyland Slim" Luandrew died on March 17, 1995 in Chicago, Illinois at the age of 87. He was coming home from a winter show, he slipped and fell on some ice which led to medical...
Highly respected creole fiddler Creole fiddler Canray Fontenot died on July 29, 1995 after a lengthy battle with lung cancer and diabetes. His family was originally from the Duralde area, where his fa...
Thomas Andrew Dorsey, the father of gospel music, died on January 23, 1993 in Chicago, Illinois at the age of 93. He is interred there in the Oak Woods Cemetery. Earlier in his life he was a leading b...
Alton Rubin, known to the Zydeco Nation as Rockin' Dopsie "the Prince of Zydeco", died on August 26, 1993 in Opelousas, Louisiana of heart failure at the age of 64. He was married Alvina LeBlanc and h...
Trey Ardoin, lead guitar player for Chris Ardoin and NuStep and Sean Ardoin & Zydekool, was born on July 12, 1985 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.