A Mardi Gras Celebration featuring Marcia Ball & The Subdudes Comes to SOPAC Today

Marcia Ball and The Subdudes will delight longtime zydeco music fans and give newcomers plenty of reasons to join this feel-good Mardi Gras Celebration when they bring their own brand of foot-stomping musical fun to South Orange Performing Arts Center on Sat, February 25 at 8 p.m.

Marcia Ball mixes Gulf Coast Blues, New Orleans R&B, swampy Louisiana ballads, and jumping, Tex-­Mex flavored zydeco into a one­?of­?a­?kind musical gumbo, a sound she has perfected over the course of her legendary career. In 2010, she was inducted into the Gulf Coast Hall Of Fame and in 2012 into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame. She's received a total of six Living Blues Awards and nine Blues Music Awards and has a whopping 42 nominations. She's received five Grammy Award nominations, including five of her six previous Alligator albums.

The Subdudes draw most of their inspiration from the sounds of their native New Orleans, blending Blues, Gospel, Funk, and R&B with their own harmony vocals. Over the course of 25 years and ten albums, the Subdudes have quietly become one of America's national music treasures. Led by singer and guitarist Tommy Malone and accordionist, John Magnie, The Subdudes New Orleans sound is noted for the band's substitution of a tambourine player, Steve Amedée, for a drummer.

The New Orleans-formed group is a living encapsulation of American music-a vibrant cauldron of sounds that stirs together meaty grooves and Jazzy dynamics, soulful R&B swagger, easy vocal harmonies, cheeky Rock 'n' Roll attitude and Folky social consciousness-not to mention some of the sharpest musicianship and ensemble playing you'll ever hear from any five musicians.

Marcia Ball and The Subdudes will perform at SOPAC on February 25 at 8 p.m. Tickets are $45-65 and can be purchased online at SOPACnow.org, or by calling the box office at (973) 313-2787.

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