the casual fan who knows only one song, this is it. For the diehard fan who knows them all, this is the standard by which all other are measured. Rebirth formed in 1983 while the core members – trumpeter and singer Kermit Ruffins, tuba player and bandleader Philip Frazier, and brother Keith Frazier on bass drum – were still students at Joseph S. Clark High School in the Tremé neighborhood. They had the benefit of hearing traditional bands like the Olympia march by their house, and they also witnessed the Dirty Dozen and Chosen Few reinvent the tradition in the late 70s and early 80s. First recorded in 1987, “Do Watcha Wanna” signaled Rebirth’s arrival as a contender, with Kermit’s lyrics placing the song squarely within a long legacy of New Orleans party classics. 

2) Feel Like Funkin It Up - Rebirth Brass Band (5:40)

Keith Frazier, Phillip Frazier III, Kermit Ruffins / Streetbrass Music, BMI

What sets Rebirth apart from the pack is their catalogue of original songs, standards that every other band is required to know. At the base of each and every one is a bass line set by “Tuba Phil,” and since it is the tuba that differentiates brass band music from other styles, his tiny melodies have come to symbolize the uniqueness of his hometown’s musical culture. “Feel Like Funkin It Up” is recognizable around the world as perhaps the most famous tuba riff in all of brass band music. When Philip suffered a stroke in 2008, he began the process of relearning his own music by playing these 12 notes. On top of the foundation he built, the bass drum and snare drum lay out the funky grooves that keep the dancers moving, and the trumpets, trombones and saxophones all mash together to create the thick textures that characterize traditional New Orleans jazz. The band calls their signature sound “junk” aka “jazz” + “funk”!

3) Casanova - Rebirth Brass Band (4:18)

Reginald Calloway / Screen Gems-Emi, Sony-ATV, BMI 

Just where does this perennial crowd favorite, which gets more requests locally than any other, hail from? You guessed it: Cleveland. That’s where R&B vocal group LeVert teamed up with songwriter Reginald Calloway to create a crossover hit that went nationwide in 1987. No matter how songs make their way to New Orleans, if audiences want to hear them then local musicians will eventually re-arrange them for the horns and drums of the brass band. On “Casanova,” Philip takes LeVert’s synthesized bass and transposes it onto the tuba, while the horn players “sing” the vocal with their instruments. Taken from Rebirth’s raunchiest record, Hot Venom, “Casanova” is a raucous ride that is rawer than any music that ever came out of Cleveland. 

4) Let Your Mind Be Free - Soul Rebels (6:37)

B. Bernard-M. Campbell-D. Francois-S. Johnson-L Le Blanc-D. Moss-C.

Watson / Soul Rebels Music, BMI

While all of Rebirth’s songs can be performed on the move, in the streets, the Soul Rebels have cast themselves as a stage band extraordinaire. After getting their start as the Young Olympians – a training ground for the august Olympia band – the Rebels walked away from tradition and radically reoriented the brass band around the music and lyrics of hip-hop. Entering into a tradition that stretches back for more than a century, the Soul Rebels charged out of the gate in 1994 with the restless, progressive title track to their debut record Let Your Mind Be Free. Until that time, there were very few songs in the brass band repertoire with solo vocals, because they simply can’t be heard on the street. But “Let Your Mind Be Free” opens with a spoken introduction in they style of rap, with words that deal directly with race, poverty, and violence. “Let Your Mind Be Free” caused a revolution in the brass band scene, alienating older traditionalists and galvanizing younger progressives. The most accurate measure of the song’s impact is its ubiquity: it is now required learning for every brass band musician.

5) Knock With Me Rock With Me - Lil Rascals (5:52)

(Glen David Andrews)

The ‘Lil Rascals were only around for a few years but their impact continues to resonate today. Bandleader and trombone player Corey Henry has worked his way through Kermit Ruffins’ BBQ Swingers, Rebirth, and Galactic, and is one of the most exciting soloists in the city. The rest of the band roster reads like a “who’s who” of the current scene, including Gregory Veals (trombone), Chad Honore (trumpet), Vincent Broussard and Ben Ellman (saxophones), Terrence Andrews (bass drum), and Jeffrey Hills (tuba). Their 2001 album Buck it Like a Horse features two all-time classics, “Rascals’ Got Fire” and “Knock With Me - Rock With Me.” The latter starts with a blast of horns in standard fashion but then, in an instant, vocalist Glen David Andrews enters with a full-throated shout and commands the song for its duration of seven and a half minutes. At 22, Andrews established himself as an unparalleled singer and lyricist, with his confessional words about drugs and violence in his Sixth Ward neighborhood. Based on the tuba riff from Rebirth’s “Casanova,” “Knock With Me - Rock With Me” is unquestionably the most played brass band recording of the twenty-first century at dances and DJ parties.

6) It Ain’t My Fault - Olympia Brass (Band 5:19)

Joseph Smokey Johnson-Wardell Quezerque / Swing Bear Songs, BMI 

Saxophonist Harold Dejan founded the Olympia in 1962, and after several decades of playing on the streets and touring the world they were established as the most important traditional band in a city of many, many traditions. But the Olympia were by no means staunch preservationists. They were innovative for their time, playing the popular music of the period, which happened to be soul and R&B. “It Ain’t My Fault” was a regional hit in 1965 for Smokey Johnson, the funky drummer known for his slinky grooves, and Wardell Quezerque, the maestro arranger known as the “Creole Beethoven.” Dejan and his co-leader Milton Batiste arranged the song for brass band, and at some point, someone added words to the original melody. If you’re ever looking for foolproof way to test someone’s knowledge of New Orleans music, just sing “noooooooo – it ain’t my fault” and see how they react.

7) Grazing In The Grass - Treme Brass Band (4:26)

Harry Elston-Philemon Hou / Cherio Corp., BMI

After departing the progressive Dirty Dozen band in the early 1980s, drummer Benny Jones steered clear of music until the early 1990s, when he founded the Treme Brass Band as an explicitly traditional outfit. Benny always ensures that his musicians are dressed in the traditional “black and whites” – white work shirt, black pants and shoes, and a visored cap – and they play slower and less abrasive than the Dozen and their followers. “Grazing in the Grass” was an instrumental pop hit for South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela in 1968, and here Benny and bass drummer “Uncle” Lionel Batiste hold down the rhythm while longtime members Kenneth Terry (trumpet), Roger Lewis (sax), and Bruce Brackman (clarinet) bring new life to Masakela’s melodies.

8) Olympia On Parade - Olympia Brass Band (3:08)

Milton Joseph Batiste-Harold Dejan

The brass band tradition is full of songs that fit the pattern of a 12-bar blues, such as “E-flat Blues,” “Big Fat Woman,” and this one, “Olympia On Parade.” The song begins with the characteristic drum roll, which always signals the start of the uptempo celebration at a traditional jazz funeral.

9) Apache - New Birth Brass Band (3:28)

Jeremiah Patrick Lordan - Regent Music, BMI

New Birth formed out of the Junior Olympia band in the 1980s, and original drummers Cayetano "Tanio" Hingle and Kerry Hunter still lead the band. Known for originals such as “A.P. Tureaud” and “Caribbean Second Line,” this particular recording is of a song with a much longer history. “Apache” was an instrumental hit for the British rock band The Shadows in 1960, and covered by the seminal hip-hop group The Sugarhill Gang in 1982. It’s this later version that New Birth takes as a starting point, swapping out the drum machines, keyboards, and samplers for the “unplugged” brass band.

10) The Second Line - Hustlers Brass Band (4:26)

Traditional / Warren Hildebrand Music, BMI

“Second Line” is one of the most recognizable tunes in all of New Orleans music. The title refers to the parades that brass bands have played on Sunday afternoons for over a century. The music itself is based on “Joe Avery’s Piece,” written in the 1950s by trombonist Joe Avery, a founding member of the Tuxedo Brass Band. In 1962, Milton Batiste added the familiar 4-note trumpet introduction – da-da-daaaaaa-da! – on a recording with Bill Sinigal & the Skyliners called “Second Line.” The song is inescapable, and the tiny trumpet riff says “New Orleans” to all who encounter it. This version comes from the Hustlers Brass Band, formed after Hurricane Katrina by members of the Soul Rebels who had evacuated to Houston and resettled there.

11) Mardi Gras In New Orleans - Olympia Brass Band (6:48)

Henry Roland Byrd / Professor Longhair Music, BMI

Mardi Gras rules the calendar for New Orleanians, and for a few weeks the entire city bounces along to the same soundtrack: a handful of songs that are rarely heard outside the city limits but are as familiar as gumbo to everyone within them. Professor Longhair is the acknowledged king of the jukebox during Carnival season, and his R&B favorite from 1949, “Mardi Gras in New Orleans,” became a popular arrangement for brass bands as well. Here, trumpeter Milton Batiste steps out front to sing Longhair’s winding vocal melody.

12) Who Dat Called Da Police - New Birth Brass Band (5:48)

Cayetano Hingle / Fat Black Music, BMI

A thrilling example of the most current sound, which merges two very different musical styles born of the streets: brass band and hip-hop. Once again, Glen David Andrews shows his prowess as a singer, a rare gift in a scene dominated by instrumentalists. The song is rooted by the signature tuba line from Kerwin “Fat” James, which travels up and down the notes of an F-minor chord in entrancing circles. On top of his subterranean bass are the interweaving melodies of the trumpets, trombones, and saxes, each adding their part to the dense counterpoint that harkens back to the days of Armstrong, Bechet, and Oliver. When Kerwin passed away in 2007, his brother Philip Frazier of Rebirth played this song in his honor as the jazz funeral wound through the Tremé neighborhood where they were raised.

13) I Feel Like Busting Loose - Rebirth Brass Band (3:55)

Charles L Brown / Ascent Music-Nouveau Music-Swing T Music, BMI

The style known as “Go-Go” has a lot in common with New Orleans brass band: funky, syncopated, trance-like music made for dancers, confined to a particular region, in this case, Washington D.C. “Bustin Loose” was Go-Go pioneer Chuck Brown’s biggest hit, in 1978, and it’s no surprise that the song seems tailor-made for brass band. Rebirth imported the horn lines and group chant straight out of the original, and remapped the bass and drums onto the mobile rhythm section of the marching band. Like all of the songs on this record, “Bustin Loose” is a musical pronouncement of collective joy and unbridled enthusiasm. Just drop the needle anywhere on this album to get the party started.