PUTNEY — It seems like every year, New Orleans native and local bandleader Peter Simoneaux makes it a mission to remind everyone that the end of the holiday season - the Twelfth Night of Christmas - is also the beginning of that time of year known as Carnival.
From Jan. 6 until the day before Ash Wednesday (this year, March 5), New Orleans is the center for a series of weekend parades and parties in January and February that culminate with the wild pre-Lenten celebration known in New Orleans as Mardi Gras, and most everywhere else as Carnival.
As such, on Saturday, Jan. 5, the longtime Brattleboro ensemble known as the Celebration Brass Band will host a special Twelfth Night Carnival Kickoff at the recently reopened and rebranded Club VT (formerly known as The Putney Inn).
Founded in 2009, under Simoneaux's leadership the Celebration Brass Band has become familiar to Brattleboro-area audiences for the distinctively vibrant music known as the New Orleans Brass Band sound through their performances at numerous Gallery Walks, the Strolling of the Heifers, Fourth of July parades, and a host of other local events.
The frontline of the band features a bevy of local luminaries including Walter Slowinski and Ron Kelley on saxophones; Dan DeWalt, Chuck Ober, and/or Brian Bender on trombones; and Anders Burrows on trumpet.
The backline features either Tim Ellis or Linda Simoneaux on sousaphone, Stephen Voorhees on snare drum, and Pete Simoneaux on bass drum, while also often featuring Linda Simoneaux as parade marshal.
The Simoneauxs say that this will likely be the first New Orleans-style Twelfth Night celebration ever to be celebrated in Putney.