Since 1978 I've cycled in and out of hosting radio shows focusing on Americana music.  The years have left me jaded about the self-aggrandizing promotion of commercial musicians.  They come and they go and they're as boring as any commercially packaged product.  The fascinating musicians are those who aren't packaged.  Local New Orleans musicians and legacy musicians like Sleepy LaBeef.  Sleepy is not a oldies performer re-packaging nostalgia but a living embodiment of what made the 1950s – 1970s the golden era of Americana music.  Like the late Snooks Eaglin, during  Sleepy's live performance, he acts as a human jukebox dynamically covering the entire American songbook as the audience shouts out songs from the 1950s to 1970s.  Sleepy can perform this feat because Sleepy is one of the unheralded creators of our American songbook.

Sleepy missed commercial success but he remains the musician's musician.  The record collector's “must have.”  The cognoscente's reference point.  Moreover, Sleepy uniquely never lost his muse to time or commercial considerations.  A muse that Sleepy and his contemporaries used to define today's celebrated American sound. 

It is easy to forget the cultural context of 1950s to 70s music.  Everyday and every moment of that era contained a threat of significant social, legal and even violent repercussions for crossing a segregation line that had been enforced for centuries.  That is; until Sleepy LaBeef and his contemporaries found that combining race records with popular music created such enjoyment that people momentarily ignored the barriers.

In every small southern venue where Sleepy sent teenagers screaming with joy and into spasms of dance, Sleepy and his contemporaries fundamentally changed the social equation behind the segregation rationale.  They proved through music that segregation “felt 'boring and backwards,'”  and they pioneered the idea that “integration” could be a wildly enjoyable cultural improvement instead of as an ominous threat to civilization.  This music is an often unheralded contribution to progress as is the rare musicians from that era who are still performing today.      

Next Saturday night, Sleepy will perform at Rock and Bowl on a double bill with Tab Beniot then the following Sunday (November 30th) he will be at Chickee Wah Wah.  He's the must see performer until the next Ponderosa Stomp rolls into town.   

Jamie Dell'Apa

Saturday midnight to Sunday 3am shift

"Music you've never heard by musicians you've never heard of"