Carrying NOLA’s Brass Torch High
Funky Dawgz bring inspiration from the birthplace of jazz to New England
Funky Dawgz Brass Band (photo courtesy Funky Dawgz)
The New Orleans brass band second line parade has to be one of the most enduring images of jazz in the popular imagination. Close your eyes and think about it – band members stepping in time somewhere in the French Quarter in white shirts, black tie and trousers, with white “Good Humor” hats perched on their heads, blowing old standards like “Joe Avery’s Blues” or “I’ll Fly Away” – can’t you almost taste the beignets and chicory coffee?
Just as other styles of jazz migrated far and wide from the Crescent City, so, too has the brass band, and Connecticut’s own Funky Dawgz Brass Band is a top-notch exemplar of how dedicated musicians take inspiration from a crucible of art and make it their own.
Respect for the tradition was baked into the Dawgz from the very start as a brainchild of Marvin McNeill, who served as assistant director for athletic bands at the University of Connecticut from 2001 to 2017. Tommy Weeks, who has been playing tenor sax with the Dawgz since the beginning, was one of a handful of students in the marching band who got an email from McNeill asking if he would be interested in starting a New Orleans-style brass band at UConn.
“At first, I did not know what this was at all,” Tommy told 8495Jazz. “I was just starting college. So I looked up what a New Orleans-style brass band is, and after I watched some videos, I thought ‘This is sick. Yeah, I want to do this!’”
Eventually, the project became a credited class, and the members ended up traveling to New Orleans to meet the practitioners of the current style, which has a funkier edge than the old classics.
“We saw The Rebirth Brass Band and Soul Rebels and To Be Continued (TBC) Brass Band,” Tommy said. “We talked to the guys and saw them in person and we were all still in college at this point. It was very inspiring to be playing the music and meeting the people who were creating it in real time.
“There are very few opportunities where you can find yourself doing something like this, in any industry. This is as good as it gets. That inspired us even more.”
Tommy graduated from UConn with a music degree in 2013, but it was the organic growth of the band’s fan base while they were still in college that inspired them to keep at it. From playing university functions for no money and reading sheet music to gradually introducing their own material, to playing for packed rooms at places such as the Arch Street Tavern in Hartford early on, the Dawgz knew they had captured some sort of magic. For the past decade, the band has been a mainstay at festivals and concerts throughout the Northeast (they are taking a break until sometime in the spring of 2025 while one of the band members is getting used to being a new Dad).
They also get hired to play weddings to spread the joy of the second line with newly joined couples, but Tommy said even though the origin of the second line in New Orleans itself was at funerals, it’s impossible to get all six current members together on the short notice a funeral booking would require.
What’s not impossible, though, is to take a lesson from his own past as a young musician who found incentive in really studying the history of the New Orleans brass band tradition and transferring it to his role as assistant band director at the King School in Stamford, Conn. He said finding a mix between making sure his students realize they have to master fundamentals like knowing their scales and proper embouchures and showing them how much fun music can be is crucial. It helps that band is already an elective, that there is some sort of existing inner incentive.
“It doesn’t work out with every student but you’re already kind of set up for success there,” Tommy said. He’ll often teach them a song from the standard brass band repertoire, then show them a couple videos of a brass band – even Funky Dawgz.
“I don’t want to be boastful, but they see an audience and think that’s pretty cool. And I tell them ‘Ya know what? I started exactly where you are.’ So they have that image in their head – they can do that.”
He also thinks it’s important to be faithful to one’s inspiration without unduly trying to assume its identity – take the lesson deeply to heart and make it yours.
“If you’re going to include a type of music in your identity, you have to know about the history of it. Otherwise it’s kind of fictitious. I’ll also be the first to say the Funky Dawgz will never be an authentic New Orleans brass band because we are not from New Orleans. That will never happen. We did not grow up in New Orleans and live that life. But we can do our best to learn about it and emulate the sound and include that influence in whatever we play. But I don’t want to try to be something we’re not.”
“Summer Breeze,” from Funky Dawgz 2022 album Vertical
It’s Grammy time!
The 2025 Grammy nominations are out and a couple musicians with Connecticut ties are nominees. Waterbury native Nicole Zuraitis, who took home the 2024 Grammy for best jazz vocal album, is once again on the nominee list - this time for singing on her husband, Dan Pugach’s album, Bianca Reimagined: Music For Paws And Persistence. Nicole is included in the band’s nomination for her work on the song “Little Fears” in the best jazz performance category and the album overall is nominated in the best large jazz ensemble category.
Longtime Connecticut pianist and Hartt School instructor Zaccai Curtis’s Cubop Lives! has been nominated for best Latin jazz album.
8495Jazz Spur-Of-The-Moment jaunts TODAY!
Westport Library, Westport, CT
Afro-Semitic Experience, 2-3 pm. Free (register in advance).
Wesleyan University Crowell Concert Hall, Middletown CT
Noah Baerman Trio (music of Bill and Kenny Barron), 3 pm. Free.
Shows the rest of the week
Firehouse 12, New Haven, CT
Jamie Saft (keyboards, combo), Fri., Nov. 15, 8:30 and 10 pm. $20/8:30, $15/10 pm set.
Elicit Brewing Co., Manchester, CT
Hartford Jazz Orchestra, Mon., Nov. 11, 7:30 pm. Free.
Yale University, New Haven CT
Yale Jazz Ensembles Big Band (music of the saxophone masters). Wed., Nov. 13, 7:30 pm. Free.
VFW Post 399, Westport, CT
Altin Sencalar (trombone, combo), Thur., Nov. 14, 7:30 pm. $15.76 - $20.76.
Waterbury Palace Poli Club, Waterbury CT
Kris Allen Trio (sax, combo), Fri., Nov. 15, 7 and 9 pm. $40.
Jams
Cafe Nine, New Haven CT
New Haven Jazz Underground jam, usually 2nd and 4th Tuesday of every month: free admission
Saturday jazz jam most Saturdays, 4 pm. Free.
Jazz Societies and Organizations (great info on events, festivals, and more)
Jazz Society of Fairfield County
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