Preservation Hall Featured on the Cover of Relix Magazine

Photos by Chris Granger

60 years of music.

60 years of tradition.

60 years of family.

The October/November Relix Magazine cover story highlights the treasured musicians who fill the building at 726 Saint Peter Street with joy, just as those before them have done since June of 1961.

Read the full cover story HERE.

Since the formation of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band touring groups in the early 1960s, it's become tradition to gather the band for a photo together on Saint Peter Street.

Over the years, these group photos of New Orleans legends like Sweet Emma Barrett, Billie and DeDe Pierce, George Lewis, Willie and Percy Humphrey, Big Jim Robinson and countless others came to include new faces and iterations of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, captured by photographers from Dan Leyrer to Danny Clinch.

This Relix cover photo was a special one, gathering the current, greater Preservation Hall collective for an extended family photo, shot by New Orleans' own Chris Granger.

“My parents’ greatest creation was to offer the world this gift, by celebrating the African-American music tradition that had transformed them enough that they uprooted their lives and moved to New Orleans,” observes Ben Jaffe, the son of Allan and Sandra, who spontaneously settled down in New Orleans and founded Preservation Hall during the summer of 1961 following an extended honeymoon trip.

Sixty years later, Preservation Hall occupies a unique place in the city and beyond, as 89-year-old clarinetist Charlie Gabriel, who remains an active member, affirms: “Preservation Hall stands at the foundation of preserving, protecting and perpetuating this music. By playing in the Hall, being a part of the Hall and even just being in the Hall, you can share in the spirit of so many great musicians that have left. What they played is still in the atmosphere, it stays in the atmosphere. It never goes away.”