From an early age, Ellis Marsalis III knew what grief in New Orleans sounded like.
The shuffle of leather shoes walking a lost soul to the grave. The slow wailing of a brass band setting the pace. Some Sundays he chased the sound, his ear catching the mournful notes of “Just a Closer Walk with Thee.” And when he heard the music switch from a somber dirge to an upbeat rhythm, he knew it was time to join in.
“Once a person is buried, you have the second line. It’s the party. The good time. The celebration of life,” Marsalis III said. “It’s a community’s responsibility to celebrate the life of someone. Even if I didn’t know them, I pull out my umbrella, get my best dancing shoes on, and we’re gonna have a good time.”
In traditional jazz funerals, that moment between grief and catharsis when the deceased is lowered into the ground and the family says a final farewell is known as “cutting the body loose.”
Just as a casket feels lighter if more hands are carrying it, that metamorphosis of a private funeral march into a jubilant, street-winding second line is a way to process the death of one by joining arms with many. And for generations it’s been an important way to cope for the city’s historic black neighborhoods that through fires, plagues, and countless hurricane seasons have had to get used to saying goodbye.
But
the novel coronavirus pandemic has put jazz funerals on hold at a time when communities need it most.
