Tag: algiers point

  • Look for Katy & the Confetti Park Players at Jazz Fest!

    Look for Katy & the Confetti Park Players at Jazz Fest!

    Photo of Katy and the Confetti Park Players at Jazz Fest, by Sally Asher (those are her feet in the foreground)
    Photo of Katy and the Confetti Park Players at Jazz Fest, by Sally Asher (those are her feet in the foreground)

    Katy Hobgood Ray and the band and some of the Confetti Park Players will be performing at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival this year! We perform at the Kids Tent on Thursday, May 3, 2018 at 3 p.m. SCHEDULE

    This year Katy is leading a smaller troupe of Confetti Park Players in an interactive music set in the Kids Tent. We will do some of our favorites like “Roman Candy Man,”  “Snoball,” “Watch Out for the Pirates,” and lots of Lead Belly songs. We will also do a special tribute to our dearly departed Mr. Okra. And of course you can expect a lively performance of our theme song, “We’re Going to Confetti Park!”

    The Kids Area is a lovely zone where you can relax and enjoy a spacious safe area and special kid-oriented foods (still delicious and unique to Jazz Fest), arts & craft areas and discovery centers. and wonderful shade under the tents! There are some WONDERFUL people working and performing in the kids area on May 3!

    Our own Algiers Point-based Calliope Puppets and the International School of Louisiana Circus Arts Kids are all performing on the same day as the Confetti Park Players? How cool is that? Algiers Point represents!

    Also on May 3 are performers from Ecole Bilingue de la Nouvelle Orleans and the fabulous Micaela y Fiesta Flamenca and OperaCreole!

    We are thrilled that the local media has given us some wonderful coverage surrounding our Jazz Fest performance. Hopefully people will be curious about our music and check out the Confetti Park Players CD, which every kid should have! 🙂

    Enjoy these articles that appeared this week.

    New Orleans Advocate: Confetti Park Players offer a colorful take on Louisiana music

    Tulane New Wave: Tulane takes Jazz Fest

    Da Cubes! Jazz Fest May 3, 2018, when Katy Hobgood Ray and some of the Confetti Park Players perform at the Kids Tent at 3 p.m.
    Da Cubes! Jazz Fest May 3, 2018, when Katy Hobgood Ray and some of the Confetti Park Players perform at the Kids Tent at 3 p.m.

     

     

  • New song from Confetti Park Players: “Riding on the Mississippi River”

    New song from Confetti Park Players: “Riding on the Mississippi River”

    Exciting news from the Confetti Park workshop! The Confetti Park Players have just released their brand new single, “Riding on the Mississippi River.” The track is available on iTunes, Amazon, CD Baby, Google Play, and other digital music services.

    “A song inspired by life along the Mississippi River, where beautiful riverboats & big ships rule, & the merry sound of calliopes fills the air. This fun song by Katy Hobgood Ray & the Confetti Park Players features a Dixieland jazz band from New Orleans.”

    The song is performed by Katy Hobgood Ray and the Confetti Park Players children’s chorus. Musicians include: Jim Thornton, trumpet; Owen Callahan, clarinet; David Phy, trombone; Tim Stambaugh, tuba; Brandon Brunious; banjo; and Cale Pellick, drums. It was recorded at Word of Mouth Recording Studio, Algiers Point in New Orleans, Louisiana.

    “Let’s Go Riding on the Mississippi River” was written by Ted Lindsay, from Mooringsport, Louisiana, who was inspired to write the song when visiting Katy and her family in Algiers Point in New Orleans. Ted was a principal songwriter on We’re Going to Confetti Park!, the first full-length album from the Confetti Park Players and winner of a Parents’ Choice Award.

    Let’s go riding on the Mississippi River
    from St. Paul to New Orleans
    It’s 2000 miles all the way
    down the middle of the USA!

    About Katy Hobgood Ray & the Confetti Park Players

    Katy leads a fun mashup of a kids choir and fabulous, well-established adult New Orleans musicians. They perform catchy originals and familiar folk songs, jump rope jingles and clapping chants, and a few rock ‘n roll surprises.

    The Confetti Park Players have collaborated with such musical talents as world-renowned jazz drummer Johnny Vidacovich, flutist Patti Adams of the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, internationally lauded clarinetist Evan Christopher, Lincoln Center-affiliated jazz trumpeter Jon-Erik Kellso, Dirty Dozen Brass Band saxophonist Roger Lewis, beloved New Orleans piano players Tom McDermott and AJ Loria.

    They’ve performed at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, French Quarter Fest, the Folk Art Fest, Mid-City Bayou Boogaloo, Beignet Fest, Creole Tomato Fest, Fête Française, and numerous venues around New Orleans. They are regularly featured on the Confetti Park radio program.

    About Confetti Park

    Confetti Park is a children’s media workshop, weekly radio program and podcast based out of New Orleans. We work with children to build community by sharing stories, music, and culture. The name for Confetti Park comes from a small playground in the heart of Algiers Point, a charming and historical neighborhood on the West bank of the Mississippi River. Learn More

     

  • Interview with Ol’ Chumbucket, co-creator of Talk Like a Pirate Day

    Interview with Ol’ Chumbucket, co-creator of Talk Like a Pirate Day

    Ol' Chumbucket reads to kids at Hubbell Library in Algiers Point
    Ol’ Chumbucket reads to kids at Hubbell Library in Algiers Point

    In this episode of Confetti Park, Katy Hobgood Ray interviews Ol’ Chumbucket, the co-creator of International Talk Like a Pirate Day on September 19. Chumbucket, also known as John Baur in certain circles, lives in New Orleans today (he has lived in many places including the Virgin Islands) and spends much of his time traveling the pirate festival circuit promoting his books and pirate culture.

    Chrissie Warren: Pirate Hunter, is his latest. It’s a truly entertaining young adult book about a 13-year-old girl in colonial Virginia who disguises herself as a boy in order to sign onto a merchant ship. What drives her to such rash madness? She must rescue her father, who has been taken by terrible pirates. This book is a great ride!

    Ol’ Chumbucket has co-authored  at least eight books about pirate culture with his buddy Cap’n Slappy (a.k.a Mark Summers, the co-creator of Talk Like a Pirate Day), including A Li’l Pirate’s ABSeas, “a piratical romp through the alphabet with all that that implies. Sometimes rude, sometimes downright dangerous and subversive, but always fun and always funny.”

    Kids in the Algiers Point neighborhood where Confetti Park is located were very lucky to have Ol’ Chumbucket come to the Hubbell Library. He and the NOLA Pyrates Society sang sea shanties and shared pirate lore. Katy recorded this interview with Chumbucket outside the library located near the river. (You can hear the wind! Sorry for the rumbles.)

    Here she talks to him about the genesis of International Talk Like a Pirate Day, and they uncover what it is that makes pirates so universally appealing.

    Says Chumbucket: “Pirates, they’re an expression of freedom. We always tell people it’s ‘Talk Like a Pirate Day’—not ‘Commit Felonies Like a Pirate Day.’ We’re not advocating you actually waylay a Spanish galleon.

    But… pirates were the freest people on earth. They lived by their own rules; they rejected convention. So when you go out and live your life for YOU instead of the rules that everybody else’s putting on you, the TV ads that tell you you have to smell like this, and the magazine ads that tell you you have to wear these shoes… if you do what you want, because it’s what you want, then you’re living like a pirate.”

    For more information about Ol’ Chumbucket, visit his websites https://baurlife.com/ and  http://talklikeapirate.com/.

     

  • The Confetti Park Podcast

    We are very excited to announce the debut of the Confetti Park podcast—a show for kids of all ages. We will feature magical, locally-spun music and stories created right here in Louisiana. Subscribe on iTunes!

    The radio program version launches on the air on April 2015. Listen for us in New Orleans on WHIV 102.3 FM New Orleans every Saturday at 12:30 p.m.

    Community radio stations, interested in carrying Confetti Park? Contact Katy Ray.

    Here is a sneak preview of things to come.