Tuning into Tremé with Larry Blumenfeld, The Wall Street Journal — Do You Know What It Means?

• Performing Arts

In Sidney Bechet’s memoir, “Treat It Gentle,” the late, great clarinetist’s real grandfather is supplanted by Omar, a fictional figure based on a folk tale, all the better to convey stirring truths about the true origins of New Orleans jazz. Real and imagined intermingle pointedly in New Orleans, in all walks of life. Set in New Orleans, David Simon’s fictional HBO series “Tremé,” now in its third season, picked up three months after the floods that resulted from the levee failures after Hurricane Katrina. Culture, which in New Orleans means a tight braid of music, cuisine, dance, visual art, and street life, is the primary focus of the series, as indeed it was and is the defining element of the city’s recovery and renewed identity.

These 90-minute conversations, led by writer Larry Blumenfeld, who has written extensively about New Orleans since the flood, will use the third season of the HBO series to frame a wide-ranging consideration of jazz culture in New Orleans and its role in continued recovery.  Excerpts from the show will be screened, and special guests—musicians, participants in the series, and scholars—will join in the discussion.

Do You Know What It Means? What will New Orleans sound like, look like, and stand for in the future? What has it meant in the past? We’ll look at how the characters envision a “new” New Orleans in the HBO series and how that identity is playing out in real life.