Mardi Gras With New Orleans Jazz Clarinetist Doreen Ketchens
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Who is Doreen Ketchins and what is her significance in New Orleans?
This is Fresh Air. I'm Tanya Mosley. And if you're ever in the French Quarter in New Orleans, chances are you've spotted my guest today, clarinetist and vocalist Doreen Ketchins. For over 30 years, she's performed on the corner of Royal and St. Peter Street, four days a week, sometimes 12 hours a day, with her band, Doreen's Jazz New Orleans.
Doreen Ketchins has many nicknames, Lady Louie, Queen Clarinet, and Miss Satchmo, nods to her passionate performances of Dixieland and traditional jazz, and for her ability to hit and hold high notes for long periods of time, like the great trumpeteer Louis Armstrong. Ketchins has performed for four U.S. presidents, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, and Jimmy Carter. And initially, she played classical clarinet before her late husband, Lawrence Ketchins, introduced her to jazz while the two were students at Loyola University. Lawrence was an accomplished musician in his own right, too. As part of Doreen's band, he played the tuba, valve trombone, drums, and piano, becoming a major attraction for his ability to play the sousaphone and drums at the same time.
A few years ago, Ketchins fulfilled her dream of performing at the Kennedy Center. She's also played with orchestras around the world. Doreen Ketchins, welcome to Fresh Air. Thanks for having me. I want to offer my sincerest condolences on the loss of your husband, Lawrence, who just died this past January. And I had the pleasure of going down the rabbit hole of watching your performances. And aside from being utterly captivated, I was also just taken by what felt like magic watching the two of you performing together. Are you still performing? Yeah.
Yep. I mean, I don't want to get haunted for the rest of my life, you know. That's what he'd do. He used to always tell me, you know, you got to play no matter what. So that's what I'm doing. And it's working. It's working. I get strength from just thinking about the times he's been in the audience, you know. And giving me a nod, you know, one way or the other.
It seemed like there was such a great love between the two of you, and your love language was the music. You all performed together for many decades, and I think maybe a beautiful way to start our conversation is to actually hear a little bit of the two of you. I watched this video of you two performing for the New Orleans Jazz Station, WWOZ, and And there you are, playing the clarinet and singing, and Lawrence was playing sousaphone and the drums at the same time. I don't actually think I've ever seen that in my life. I was thinking, how? Can I play a little bit of that performance? Yes, please. The song is House of the Rising Sun.
They call the rising sun It's been the run of many a line And now I know who I want
That was my guest today, Doreen Ketchins and her late husband Lawrence playing House of the Rising Sun. Doreen, what a remarkable performance. I mean, as I mentioned, Lawrence is playing the drums and blowing into that sousaphone, which is a type of tuba, at the same time. How did he figure out that he had that talent?
We had drummer problems. And the drummer didn't show up, and he was tired of it. And we were on the street. He said he wasn't that good anyway. I bet you I could play just as good as him and play the tuba. And so he sat behind the drums, and he took one stick in his left hand, and he just started to do it. I mean, just like that. And it was there. He can't play rolls and stuff like that, so he does the inflections. You know what I mean? So... If you're just listening to the drummer, you know, there's a lot of space in there. But if you're listening to the group, then he fills in all of these spaces that you would normally hear the drummer do. It's just amazing, you know. But Necessity is the mother of invention, and he invented the tuba drummer.
One thing I noticed is that you've got a growl that, you know, it's not only present in your singing voice, but we also heard it while you were playing the clarinet. How do you do that? Like you make your clarinet growl.
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