1) Modern to Contemporary Masters: Works on Paper continues at the Michael C. Carlos Museum.
2) The Plaza screens Spaceballs for this month’s Flicks & Giggles.
3) Atlanta Cajun Zydeco Association hosts a Mardi Gras dance party.
4) … And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead plays the Earl.
5) Mary Kay Andrews signs and discusses Deep Dish at Outwrite.
(Photo by Paul Strand)
1) Supercross invades the Georgia Dome.
2) Ramsey Lewis performs at the Rialto Center.
3) Mardi Gras celebrations kick off all over town.
4) Noot d’ Noot and Dark Meat play the Earl.
5) TribalCon continues in Decatur with a belly dance performance and a postshow hafla.
(Photo by Brian Robinette)
By Lizzy Encarnacao
Mardi Gras season has long since begun in New Orleans. For those who have the time and the stamina, it’s a seven-hour drive to the Big Easy. Fortunately, Atlanta found a way to import some Mardi Gras fun.
Parish Foods & Goods hosts a party with enough beads, beer and food to go around Feb. 21. Plenty of tents and heaters will keep the winter chills at bay as Charlie Wooten’s Zydefunk performs. In the spirit of community, Parish will accept donations on behalf of the Atlanta Community Food Bank.
If you’re looking to get your hands on a traditional Mardi Gras king cake — the giant sweet roll braided with cinnamon and sugar and topped with green, purple and gold icing — you can avoid grocery store cakes or making your own by placing an order with Parish; pickup is Feb. 22.
Northside Tavern hosts a king cake party Feb. 20 featuring Zydefunk. If your slice of cake has the plastic baby in it, you’re declared the king of the party and win a $50 bar tab.
Of course there’s nothing wrong with outsourcing. Many bakeries in Louisiana, such as Randazzo’s Camellia City Bakery and Gambino’s, accept orders online and will ship anywhere in the continental United States. Be warned: Some of these cakes are quite large, so it’s not advisable to eat an entire one yourself. After all, the spirit of Mardi Gras calls for a party.
Front Page News hosts the Little Five Points Mardi Gras Music & Food Festival Feb. 21. The celebration features five bands, including Kindsized, New Orleans funk and blues band the Squirrelheads, and Little Five Points-based band Webster. Guests can eat, drink and be merry with an extensive New Orleans menu that goes way beyond jambalaya and SoCo Hurricanes.
The Steamhouse Lounge hosts Oysterfest at its new Midtown location Feb. 21-22. The two-day event features more than 40,000 pounds of oysters and 100 gallons of Steamhouse lobster bisque. Since Oysterfest runs until sunset, you’ll have plenty of time to pack an evening Mardi Gras party into your schedule.
If you’re a purist and prefer to put off your celebration until Fat Tuesday, the Atlanta Cajun Zydeco Association hosts a Mardi Gras dance party Feb. 24. With a free dance lesson preceding the dance itself, you can learn how to Cajun-waltz and jitterbug before the DJ takes the stage.
(Photo by bitzcelt/Flickr.com)
COURT OF SURRREALS: Mobile, Ala.'s African-American Mardi Gras court
The Order of Myths presents Mobile, Ala.’s Mardi Gras as the country’s first such celebration, predating New Orleans’, and as one of the South’s last bastions of segregation. Mobile’s white and African-American communities each embrace the pomp, pageantry and parades of Mardi Gras, and while their festivities may be unequal, they’re definitely separate.
Director Margaret Brown, a white native of Mobile, returns to her hometown to chronicle the preparations for the 2007 Mardi Gras, particularly the hoopla and costuming surrounding the queens of the respective “royal courts.” Willowy Helen Meaher hits the country club circuit as the queen of the white organization, while schoolteacher Steffanie Lucas serves as her African-American counterpart of sorts. The two have more connections than they or the audience realize. Brown’s interviewees allege that the well-established Meaher family hired a slave ship that ran in the Mobile area in 1859, and that some of the unwilling passengers were distant relatives of Lucas. “My people was on her people’s ship,” Lucas says. (more…)
