performing at the Maple Leaf on December 15, 2015 The Maple Leaf is located at 8316
Oak Street in the
Carrollton neighborhood. Opened on February 24, 1974, it is one of the longest continuously operating New Orleans music clubs with live performances seven nights a week. On the first night Andrew Hall's Society Jazz Band played and were there every Saturday for seven years. Many of the old time musicians were featured, including members of the
Preservation Hall Jazz Band. The Society Jazz Band left in the summer of 1981 but have played there several times since then, including the 30th birthday party in 2004 and the 40th birthday party in 2014. Musical styles represented include
blues,
funk,
R&B,
rock,
zydeco,
jazz,
jam bands. Frequent performers have included
James Booker,
Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown,
Henry Butler,
Walter "Wolfman" Washington,
Papa Grows Funk, and
The Radiators. The bar has been an incubator for young bands formed by students at
Tulane University,
Loyola University, and the
University of New Orleans. In recent history, the bar has weekly hosted residencies from acts such as
Tank and the Bangas,
The Revivalists,
George Porter Jr.,
Jon Cleary (musician) and
Johnny Vidacovich. Porter still holds a weekly, Monday night residency at the bar with his trio, featuring
Terrence Houston, and Michael "Goldenthroat" Lemmler. Poet
Everette Maddox was so closely tied to the venue that his ashes are buried in the bar's patio area. The Maple Leaf hosts poetry readings and fashion shows. The
Krewe of OAK starts and ends its parades at the Maple Leaf, where it holds its Krewe Ball. The Maple Leaf is thinly disguised in the
Ellen Gilchrist short story "The Raintree Street Bar and Washerteria" (the bar used to contain a laundromat). Poems about it can be found in
Mirror Wars and
Shards by
Nancy Harris,
Body and Soul and
Rhythm & Booze by
Julie Kane;
The Everette Maddox Song Book,
Bar Scotch, and
American Waste by Everette Maddox; and in the anthologies
The Maple Leaf Rag (1980),
The Maple Leaf Rag 15th Anniversary Anthology (1994), and
Maple Leaf Rag III (2006). ==Hurricane Katrina==