At a crawfish boil during last years New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, I asked songwriter Paul Sanchez which New Orleans musician he thought was most deserving of attention outside the Crescent City. "John Boutté," he said without a moment's hesitation. "He's the best singer in town." I didn't get a chance to hear Boutté until this year's Jazz Fest, where, backed by a jazz group, he sang tunes like Stevie Wonder's "You Haven't Done Nothin'" to a big crowd. I was highly impressed, and looked forward to hearing him in a smaller room.
I was overwhelmed Friday night in Central Park's outdoor Delacorte Theater in front of an audience thinned by an earlier shower, accompanied only by a guitarist and occasionally banging a tambourine, John Boutté sang a devastating set of tunes inspired in large part by Katrina and its aftermath. Boutté sings in a rough sweet voice that can take you places no other vocalist can. He sings jazz like a soul singer, and soul, folk, and rock tunes like the jazz virtuoso he is. His impeccable taste helps. Boutté opened his set with Rogers and Hammerstein's ironic antiracist song "You've Got to Be Carefully Taught" (from South Pacific) and continued with Neil Young's unironic antiracist statement "Southern Man." He also sang Arlo Guthrie's "City of New Orleans," a heartbreaking "Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans," and Randy Newman's eerily prophetic "Louisiana 1927" (which you can see him perform with Paul Sanchez here). Somewhere in the middle he lightened up with Allen Toussaint's"Lipstick Traces (on a Cigarette)," a hit for r&b singer Lee Dorsey. Mr. Toussaint, who relocated to New York after Katrina and happened to be sitting behind me, beamed his approval.
