What Does WWOZ Mean to You?

Having moved out of New Orleans, I'm acutely aware of the absolute need in my life for the kind of street-level culture that New Orleans provides and WWOZ broadcasts-- the music that flows from clubs where you can get your drink and hang out on the sidewalk-- the improvisation, the original music, the standards-- with ne'er a cover band in sight-- and having traveled in Europe lately and finding no radio station that played jazz like OZ's-- nor a vital local music scene on any radio station-- I saw WWOZ's value in my life (for the millionth time.) I'm especially grateful for the djs who bring the avant jazz to the studio-- a brand of music that has bravely survived in New O over the last twenty years, but not without struggle. I'd love to hear more of the local improvisors and avant garde composers-- Dan Ostricher and Jonathan Freilich-- Rajah Cornish and Jeff Albert, James Singleton and Helen Gillet-- I'd love to hear more of them on OZ. I love to hear where our music came from and where it's going.

I'm a fan forever. WWOZ kept the music alive during and after Katrina and ever since.

We finally signed up to get DSL at home just so we could set things up to stream OZ all day long. Then it wasn't enough to have OZ in the living room and in the kitchen/dining room... we had to buy more equipment so we could have it in the baby's room, too (those late night feedings are less painful now).

And even with the monetary investment that all that streaming entails, we still pledge. We moved away from New Orleans just before Katrina; if we'd stayed we'd have lost everything, as so many people did. Helping support OZ is one way we can help build, rebuild and renew New Orleans. So we send our pledge with love, from exile in Terre Haute, Indiana...

I moved to Gonzales in 1996. I lived in New Orleans from '71 until I moved. I miss many things about the city, and though I'm only an hour away, I don't get to go back as much I'd like. This is one way to stay connected with N.O.

you play the music special to my heart.
where else do i hear nina simone, lucinda williams and esther phillips back to back?

WWOZ matters because New Orleans matters. WWOZ is the embodiment of the culture, diversity and way of life that make New Orleans unique among the world's major cities. New Orleans wouldn't be the same with WWOZ.

WWOZ Staff and Crew,

You need to read this:

Simply put, I love your radio station.

Every day I stream your music into my sunny Southern
California dental office. I'm not from Louisiana, I'm not even from the East Coast, but ever since my first trip to your city I have become enamored with the culture, food and music of New Orleans. I contribute what I can financially, but sometimes a hug is better than a dollar. So from me to you...everyone there....a big hug...because I love your music, love your station and every way you present those notes, that history from your studio to my ears.

Thank You.

MGS D.M.D

Play at blues jams here locally in Westchester County, NY. Saw Tab Benoit at FTC Stage One in CT a few weeks ago. Music on WWOZ is great and makes my desk a better place. A connection to music I love. Thanks!!

I live in Barbados and listen to WWOZ on the Internet. Love the music especially the BLUES. Hope to visit sometime

I grew up in N.O. listening to Poppa-Stoppa, Jack the Cat, Larry Mc Kinley and Frank-Frank during the 1950's so my life is steeped in N.O. music. Today WWOZ inspires me to keep working on my novel about New Orleans, R&B, and all the changes that started in the 1950's; listening to my kind of music streaming over the web keeps me going. Thank you WWOZ-FM, M-L

I can't believe the high quality sound streaming over the internet from WWOZ. Of course, I have a spectacular set of speakers reproducing this sound ... but it goes without saying that "great speakers can't make a bad transmission into a great sound."

Listeners from around the world can certainly appreciate the great music coming from WWOZ. It's amazing!

Gordon Lee
Minneapolis

The recent passing of Snooks Eaglin and Miss Antoinette K Doe made me keenly aware of how important it is to keep the music and art tradition of New Orleans going. I think about this when I tune into WWOZ: tradition continuing on via the playlists, in-studio music sets and the knowledge and enthusiasm of the volunteer DJ's.

Keep it goin! Through radio stations like this, musicians may be gone but their influence is never lost. On the contrary, they continue laying it down for the next generation of musicians and music appreciators like myself, managing to both educate and inspire both parties.

Hi!

I listen to WWOZ a lot, mostly the blues shows.
Guess "The Problem Child" is my favorite.
But I also love Music from The Glen and many other shows. Because of the
seven hour time difference I miss a lot of shows that are broadcast in the
evenings, New Orleans time, because at that time I'm sound asleep in bed.

The reason I'm writing on this particular night is probably that I, during
my first and only (so far) visit to the Crescent City, in February 2002,
had the honor to see Snooks Eaglin perform at Dos Jefes. And now he's
gone.
I only spent a few days in your town, but totally fell in love with it!

Another coincidence is that my sister's son's father is from New Orleans.
It's sort of complicated ...

Anyway, I really love WWOZ. It's surely the best music radio station in
the world, to my mind.

Take care, y'all!

Jörgen,
Stockholm, Sweden

great question; hard for an expat new orleanian to answer because it begs the question 'why aren't you home?' but the truth is that new orleans is always with you (even if you are 'borrowing' some other city to lay your head in) because the spirit of the place is in the food i still cook and the music i still listen to as much as it is in the river silt and the oak trees ... and wwoz takes and brings me back every time i cook because the web stream goes on before the roux gets made!

WWOZ is and has been such an intregal part of my life for so many years, I can't imagine not supporting it. All the great jazz and blues makes my day go by faster and makes me feel connected to the community. I especially enjoy George Ingmire's show. He plays many of the local bands I know and see on a regular basis that are not given air time on any other show, like Rotary Downs, Happy Talk Band, Zydepunks, The New Orleans Bingo! Show and Morning 40 Federation, to name a few. Keep guarding the Groove, George, as well as all you fine ladies and gentlemen!

wwoz fills the soul with life, the expertise of the djs — most who are actual working\practicing musicians if not multi-generational working musicians — brings so much historical\factual data to the listeners that you cannot get elsewhere, but have always longed for, why?............they are the professional's professional. i've listened daily for 6 years now and been a contributing member for 4 i believe.......thanks for all you do for us out here on the inet

My Name is Umberto, Sulpasso
I am a writer
I live in italy
I lived in california
I travelled throughout India, Europe, South America and asia
I lived in New York City
I love music
I love obama
I love to see a black little girl sitting in the white house and call daddy the President
USA President, Our President
White House?
Why white?
Like Preservation hall
Hall of everybody
From Nov. 4th on
The White House
House of everybody
The Jackson Square
Renamed
Everybody Square
Biggest step forword for the humanity then getting to the moon
That’s why I wrote America is not Bush
That is coming in the bookstore on Monday
And when I was thinking of writing that book
I listened to the WWOZ radio
As they could say . . . morning, noon and night
24 hours WWOZ
I love music
I love Jazz
I love WWOZ the best jazz station of the world
And when i wrote America is not Bush
WWOZ cheered me up
WWOZ gave me Energy
24 hrs a day SHE was always there
whenever i needed
whenever i was tired
whenever i needed Energy, fun, inspiration
WWOZ 24 hours a day
and now that “American is not Bush is finished?”
I want to gift the sales of the English version of this book
From monday to November the 4th
to Barack Obama campaign AND to WWOZ
I don’t know why but I will do it
BECAUSE
I wrote that book
But the Authors were Barack and WWOZ
Thanx them both
From monday to November the 4th
I want to gift the sales of the English version of this book
to Barack Obama campaign AND to WWOZ
Who can tell me how to do it?
Any idea?
I don’t know how but
But if you help me
I will find a way
Thanx Barack
Thanx WWOZ

Want to share a poem written by my 15 year old daughter, Arielle.
She visited New Orleans only three times but really picked up on the essence of this special city. Our family settled in New Orleans in the late 1800's and our last local relative passed away a few years ago ::: I think the city is in our DNA!

Hope you enjoy the poem.

Ode To New Orleans: by Arielle Hoachuck

The sweet aroma
Of powdered sugar
and deep fried beignettes
hung in the air.
The bustling crowd
creating cosmic waves
on Bourbon Street.
Soft melodies
floated from saxophones.
When the fingers of the
French Quarter
touched my shoulders
I knew I was home.
Summers spend summer days
lazily leaning on statues
placed around Jackson square.
Damp from the humidity
Cooling my tongue from
lip burning crayfish
with sugary pralines.
When sharp notes drifting from Preservation Hall licked my ears
I knew I was home.

************
http://www.zoomonby.com

It's 7:07 AM in the suburbs of Washington, DC — an hour later than you all down there in the Big Easy . . . and it feels like time itself must go by at a more leisurely pace where you are. Maybe that's just the effect of the jaunty riffs of the Ellis Marsalis Quartet coming through my dinky Dell speakers, coupled with the colorful stoner patterns swirling to the beat on my Windows Media Player. Mesmerizing. . . .

I'm asked to say why I joined WWOZ. Well, it's a bit of a story — literally. A screenplay, to be precise. In its infancy, it was simply a story of a woman singer, trying to put her life together after a devastating act of violence. Then Katrina happened. I watched, in a way from the outside because I didn't have loved ones down there, but also connected — as I think many Americans were — because you are my countrymen and women, and it was heart-tearing to see the obliteration, chaos, and continued suffering.
Reading an article in the Washington Post one day nearly a year post-Katrina, about the struggles of New Orleans musicians to regain their livelihoods, I decided my heroine should live in New Orleans--to have lost her home and long to return, to feel the loss, the need, the call so many musicians have felt to come home and be part of the resurrection.

Enter WWOZ. I think it was a simple Google search: New Orleans musicians. Up popped the bright, friendly homepage, "WWOZ, dedicated to bringing New Orleans music to the Universe." Hey, that's me, I thought. And no — really? You fellers livestream? I was there in an instant: Dr. John, and Eddie Bo, and Irma and Cyril and Buckwheat Zydeco and Bo Dollis, and, and, and . . . the groove grabbed me and I was thrilled to be grabbed.

Months passed, fingers tapping keys as the music played, and musicians streamed through the studio to shoot the breeze, plug their gigs and new releases, and talk deeply about life after the levees broke. Station DJs, a uniformly well-informed bunch, kept us connected. "George wants some love," George intoned one day through my speakers. I shot out a fan letter. Five minutes later I heard "Wendy from Silver Spring Maryland says hi" go out to all New Orleans.

Indeed I do say hi, and one day I will do more than that: I will shepherd my story, which feels like it has grown into your story in many ways, to production down in the great city itself — enriched immeasurably by the efforts of this radio station to educate, preserve, entertain, and enlighten.

To join as a member feels like so much more than gratitude. It feels like love. And now, I can say, I too have loved ones in New Orleans. NOLA wizards of music, guardians of the groove, play on.

Wendy Anderson
Silver Spring, MD
October 4, 2008

Hello, my name is Helmut listening to your program in Berlin, Germany.

Since I have been to the first Jazzfest after Katrina in 2006, I am a total fan of NO-music and try to catch every concert of NO-musicians in Berlin and have already seen Joe Krown and Allen Toussaint twice (not together) in my hometown and was delighted. In August, the Pfister Sisters had a two-weeks-stay here, where I could show them fotos I took at their gig at the Parkway Bakery & Tavern.

Every time I want to hear fresh music from the Crescent City, I tune in WWOZ by internet-stream. I left a piece of my heart in New Orleans. Long may you live and laissez les bonnes temps roulez!