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played the Famous Door with Olivia Chariot [Cook]. Me and Lucien Barbarian hooked up together again in 1980, working for June Gardner and other people .
    Then I formed my own quintet. We played at the old Paddock Lounge, and a bunch of other clubs up and down the street, for a limited amount of time because they were firing bands left and right. There were so many bands they could choose from. The first quintet I had was me and Lucien, trumpet and trombone. Then I had a young man who had gone to high school with me, Kenneth Sara, on drums. On piano I had James Moore—he doesn’t live here anymore, but he was from New Orleans. And on bass, I had Joe Payton. And after that, I had Herlin Riley on drums, before he went out with Ahmad Jamal. Then I had Erving Charles on Fender bass, and on piano I had Phil Parnell. Then I got Shannon Powell after Herlin left. Then Richard Knox on piano, then Walter Payton on bass .
    We made our first trip to Europe in 1982. It was great. I had started playing with the Louisiana Repertory Jazz Ensemble in 1980. I played on that record they did, Alive and Well. I went to La Rochelle in France with them in May 1982, and in November, I went to Holland with my own quintet. I was twenty-four years old. I was so excited I didn’t even feel jet lag .
    We got appreciation like I’d never seen before. I’d never seen people react to jazz music the way they did there. Bourbon Street was nice, and you’d get these people, and they’d get drunk and all of that, but this was sincere. That struck me. I felt like “I want to come back here again and again.” And of course, I have been .
    Back in the States, I carried on working the clubs in New Orleans. Then in 1983 I went up to Vancouver and spent three months working with Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson. He was playing alto saxophone and singing, and I was with him at Gastown in Vancouver. I was up there with Shannon Powell—he had a lot of contacts up there, so we started working with different bands .
    I came back in 1983, and they were getting ready to hold the World’s Fair the following year, in 1984. The people that were behind the scenes for the organization were getting together a band called the Musical Ambassadors—this band was to go around promoting the Festival—they called it “A Year to Go.” Charlie Bering was the guy that had that club, Lu and Charlie’s. He was a great jazz lover and promoter of New Orleans music. Charlie got the band together, which consisted of myself, Phil Parnell, Walter Payton; Banu Gibson and Jeannie Ann Howell were the singers. On trombone was a guy called “Professor Gizmo”—I can’t think of his right name. We were a show band, played a bit of everything. We all sang, all had choreography and everything. Most of the charts were heads, and we played a few stocks .
    Then in ’84. the fair opened up and we played there a little bit. Then the Intercontinental Hotel opened, and at that time I was married to a young lady from Australia that I had met at Maison Bourbon back in ’78. She had a connection with the general manager of the Intercontinental, so I got to open at Pete’s Pub, with a quartet. I also got to play with Delia Reese for the grand opening. I had Shannon Powell on drums, Rusty Gilder on bass, and Ed Frank on piano. We were there for a year. It was a good gig. I was also playing at the newly opened Mahogany Hall, which used to be the Paddock Lounge. This was with me and Shannon, David Grillier on clarinet, Maynard Chatters on trombone; Mary Mayo was the singer, Emile Vinet on piano, and Curtis Mitchell on bass. My marriage was breaking up, but things were looking good from a business point of view. The Pete’s Pub gig folded, and the hotel started a jazz brunch on Sundays .
    In 1985, I left to go to Singapore with Trevor Richards and the Camelia Jazz Band. Trevor was on drums, Pud Brown on reeds, Quentin