Bringing New Orleans' Music Back Home

The largest redevelopment project to date in New Orleans -- a city known worldwide for its music -- is aimed at bringing musicians back to town by giving them a place to live.

1 minute read

February 23, 2007, 2:00 PM PST

By Nate Berg

"It's in the devastated Upper Ninth Ward, and it's one of the most unusual, quixotic, and totally appropriate ideas to rise from the city where jazz was born: A neighborhood by musicians, for musicians."

"Laid out in tight rows, the homes – a mix of bungalow and shotgun styles – shimmer in Caribbean colors: sun-soaked yellows, sunset pinks, deep-sea turquoise. In a city where thousands of homes are rotting on their pilings, Musicians' Village is an island of hope in a tragic sea."

"Indeed, the village, dreamed up by music philanthropists Harry Connick Jr. and Branford Marsalis and made possible by Habitat for Humanity, is both a joyful vision and an ironic critique: So far, a nonprofit project aimed at bringing musicians – and thereby music – back to the city has become the largest redevelopment project to date, with another 150 homes planned in the surrounding neighborhood."

FULL STORY: Music's new home in New Orleans

Thursday, February 15, 2007 in The Christian Science Monitor

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