Take Me to the River: New Orleans — Inside the Music, History and Living Legacy
Musicians and producers involved in Take Me to the River: New Orleans, including Martin Shore, Ian Neville, Ivan Neville, Cyril Neville, George Porter Jr., William Bell, Snoop Dogg and other participating artists. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
Aired on August 10, 2026
Aired June 1, 2022 | Updated August 10, 2026
Editor’s Note: This World Footprints episode originally aired in June 2022, shortly after the release of Take Me to the River: New Orleans. This showpage has been substantially updated with additional historical context, current information about the Take Me to the River project and an important development that followed our conversation: music recorded for the film went on to win a Grammy Award. The original podcast interview and guest comments remain unchanged.
New Orleans does not have one sound.
Its musical identity has been shaped over centuries by African rhythms, Caribbean influences, Creole culture, brass bands, gospel, rhythm and blues, jazz, funk, soul, hip-hop and bounce. Those traditions did not develop in isolation. They met, borrowed from one another and kept changing as new generations of musicians added something of their own.
That living musical culture is at the heart of the official Take Me to the River: New Orleans documentary project.
In this World Footprints podcast, Ian and I sit down in New Orleans with Grammy-winning filmmaker, producer and Take Me to the River director Martin Shore and New Orleans guitarist, producer and Grammy winner Ian Neville.
Our conversation moves from the recording studio to Hurricane Katrina, the Neville family’s musical legacy and the complicated history behind the New Orleans sound. But it also raises a question that has become even more important with time:
How do we protect a living culture without turning it into a museum piece?
“This culture is precious. It’s real… there’s no other place like it.”
— Martin Shore
Behind the scenes as Martin Shore and Ian Neville prepare for their World Footprints interview in New Orleans.
What Happened After Our Interview: A Grammy Nomination and a Win
When Martin Shore and Ian Neville joined us in 2022, this part of the story had not happened yet.
Later that year, “Stompin’ Ground,” recorded by Aaron Neville and The Dirty Dozen Brass Band for the Take Me to the River: New Orleans project, received a Grammy nomination.
Then came the win.
At the 65th Annual Grammy Awards in 2023, “Stompin’ Ground” won Best American Roots Performance.
The distinction matters: the Grammy was awarded for a recording created for the project, rather than to the documentary itself.
Berklee College of Music lists Martin Shore as a Grammy-winning producer of “Stompin’ Ground”, while the Recording Academy lists Ian Neville with a Grammy win associated with the recording.
The award added a remarkable postscript to a project built around something New Orleans musicians have done for generations—take what came before them, bring different people into the room and create something new.
Listeners can hear “Stompin’ Ground” as part of the 26-track Take Me to the River: New Orleans soundtrack.
A “Living Documentary” of New Orleans Music
One of the most interesting phrases Martin uses during our conversation is “living documentary.”
It is also one reason this interview remains relevant.
Take Me to the River: New Orleans is not simply a historical documentary assembled from archival footage and interviews. Shore wanted viewers to feel as though they were inside the room as musicians created together.
Legacy artists work alongside younger performers. Genres cross. Musical families reconnect. Artists who might appear to occupy completely different corners of the industry find common ground in the studio.
The project brought together musicians from an extraordinary range of New Orleans and American musical traditions, including members of the Neville family, Dr. John, Irma Thomas, George Porter Jr., The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, The Soul Rebels, Big Freedia, Mannie Fresh, PJ Morton and others.
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- ville records “504 (Enjoy Yourself)” with The Soul Rebels for Take Me to the River: New Orleans. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
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- Dee-1, Mannie Fresh, Erica Falls and Big Freedia record “Act Like You Know” for Take Me to the River: New Orleans. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
For Ian Neville, the experience was personal.
He grew up inside one of New Orleans’ most influential musical families. Yet he tells us that the project revealed connections within the city’s music community that even he had not completely appreciated before.
That is part of what makes New Orleans music difficult to place inside a single category.
Director Martin Shore with New Orleans music legend Dr. John during the Take Me to the River: New Orleans project. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
New Orleans Music Began Long Before Jazz Had a Name
Jazz is inseparable from New Orleans, but the musical history that made jazz possible began much earlier.
At Congo Square and in the African musical traditions that influenced early New Orleans jazz, enslaved and free Black people preserved forms of African dance, drumming and cultural expression.
The National Park Service also traces call-and-response traditions and musical influences connected to West Africa and the Caribbean, as well as the growth of brass bands and African American mutual-aid societies.
Those traditions eventually became part of the cultural environment from which jazz emerged.
They also connect directly to another New Orleans tradition we have explored on World Footprints: the history of New Orleans Second Line parades, Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs and jazz funeral traditions.
The Caribbean connection runs even deeper.
During and after the Haitian Revolution, thousands of refugees from the French colony of Saint-Domingue migrated to Louisiana. In 1809 and 1810 alone, approximately 10,000 arrived in New Orleans.
According to The Historic New Orleans Collection’s history of Haitian migration to New Orleans, their arrival doubled the city’s population and nearly tripled its population of free people of color.
That movement of people, cultures and traditions helps explain a point that surfaces repeatedly in our conversation with Shore and Neville:
There has never been only one New Orleans sound.
Hurricane Katrina and the Fragility of a Living Culture
Hurricane Katrina is another dividing line in the film and in our conversation.
Shore describes New Orleans almost as a three-act story: before Katrina, Katrina and after Katrina.
The disaster did far more than destroy buildings. Residents were displaced from neighborhoods. Families and communities were scattered. Musicians were among the New Orleanians forced to rebuild their lives elsewhere.
For a musical culture built on relationships—people learning from relatives, sharing musicians between bands, gathering in neighborhoods and passing traditions from one generation to another—displacement can threaten something that cannot simply be reconstructed with bricks and mortar.
Ian talks about what Katrina revealed about the relationships among New Orleans musicians. Bands might have appeared separate from the outside, but the people inside them were deeply connected.
The film captures some of those connections in real time.
It also leaves us with a question that extends well beyond music:
What happens to a culture when the people who create it can no longer remain in the community where it developed?
That question is also central to my book, Destination Stewardship: Drive Sustainability, Economic Renewal, and Cultural Integrity, where I include New Orleans as a case study. The city illustrates one of the fundamental challenges of destination stewardship: a place can attract visitors because of its distinctive culture while simultaneously facing pressures that make it harder for the people who sustain that culture to remain there.
A destination is not protected simply because its historic buildings survive or visitors continue to arrive. Its cultural identity also depends on residents, traditions, neighborhood institutions and culture bearers having the ability to remain part of the community.
Big Chief Monk Boudreaux, one of the New Orleans culture bearers featured in the Take Me to the River project. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
Loving New Orleans Culture Is Not the Same as Protecting It
Millions of visitors come to New Orleans because of its culture.
We listen to its music. We eat its food. We follow brass bands. We photograph its architecture. We enter clubs where generations of musicians have shaped sounds that traveled around the world.
But cultural appreciation and cultural stewardship are not automatically the same thing.
During our conversation, Martin urges visitors to look beyond a narrow version of New Orleans. Enjoy Bourbon Street, he says, but do not stop there.
That means supporting the people and places that keep the culture alive: musicians, neighborhood businesses, cultural organizations, restaurants, music venues and communities whose traditions existed long before they became visitor attractions.
This is where the idea of destination stewardship becomes particularly important. Tourism can help sustain cultural traditions when visitor spending reaches local businesses, artists and communities. But a successful visitor economy can also place pressure on housing, neighborhoods and cultural spaces if the people who give a destination its identity are pushed to the margins.
In Destination Stewardship, I argue that destinations have to consider the well-being of residents alongside the experience of visitors. New Orleans makes that relationship especially visible. Its music, food, celebrations and traditions are not products manufactured for tourism. They come from communities.
That gives this interview a meaning well beyond the film.
A culture does not survive because outsiders admire it.
It survives because people are able to keep practicing it, teaching it, earning a living from it and passing it forward.
Take Me to the River Has Become More Than a Film
The story did not end when Take Me to the River: New Orleans left theaters.
Today, the Take Me to the River Education Initiative describes a broader mission built around preserving the musical legacies of Memphis and New Orleans through documentaries, music productions, educational programs and live performances.
Its music education programs bring music history and cultural heritage into classrooms while connecting younger generations with the traditions explored in the films.
In that sense, the project has evolved much like the music it documents.
It keeps moving.
What You’ll Hear in This World Footprints Episode
6:53 — What Katrina Revealed About the New Orleans Music Community
Ian Neville talks about what working on Take Me to the River: New Orleans reinforced for him about the relationships among musicians in his hometown and what many people discovered after Hurricane Katrina.
8:26 — Katrina as a Turning Point
Martin Shore discusses New Orleans before, during and after Katrina and reflects on the city’s long history of adapting to enormous cultural and social change.
16:33 — Capturing the Neville Family Together
Ian talks about the opportunity to preserve extraordinary musical moments involving members of his family and musicians whose relationships span generations.
24:12 — Finishing the Film During the Pandemic
Martin explains the challenge of completing and releasing Take Me to the River: New Orleans during the pandemic and why he wanted audiences to experience the film and its music together.
Scenes from Take Me to the River: New Orleans
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- Alonzo Brown, Mark Mullins and Bobby Campo record during the Take Me to the River: New Orleans sessions. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
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- PJ Morton records during the Take Me to the River: New Orleans sessions. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
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- Irma Thomas during a recording session for Take Me to the River: New Orleans. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
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- Musicians and producers from Take Me to the River: New Orleans, including Boo Mitchell, G-Eazy, Martin Shore, Terence Higgins, Ivan Neville, Zach Fawcett, Cyril Neville, Ian Neville, George Porter Jr., William Bell, Snoop Dogg, Big Sam, Khris Royal, Jamelle Williams and Cody Dickinson. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
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- The Neville Brothers with Big Sam, members of The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Terence Higgins and fellow musicians and crew during the Take Me to the River: New Orleans project. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
About Martin Shore
Grammy-winning filmmaker and producer Martin Shore began his career as a professional musician before moving into filmmaking and music production.
His first Take Me to the River documentary explored the musical legacy of Memphis and won the Audience Award at SXSW. He followed it with Take Me to the River: New Orleans, expanding the idea by bringing musicians of different generations and genres together while exploring the history behind the music.
Shore is also the founder of the nonprofit Take Me to the River Education Initiative. In 2023, he became a Grammy-winning producer through “Stompin’ Ground.”
About Ian Neville
New Orleans guitarist and producer Ian Neville is the son of Art “Poppa Funk” Neville, a founding member of The Meters and The Neville Brothers.
Ian helped form Dumpstaphunk with his cousin Ivan Neville and other New Orleans musicians, carrying the city’s funk tradition into another generation while developing a sound of their own.
He produced and appeared in Take Me to the River: New Orleans and participated in music connected to the project. The Recording Academy lists Ian with a Grammy win associated with “Stompin’ Ground.”
Art Neville, Ian Neville, Charles Neville, Aaron Neville, Cyril Neville and Ivan Neville. The Neville family represents generations of New Orleans music history. Photo courtesy of TMTTR.
Explore More of New Orleans With World Footprints
New Orleans music makes more sense when we understand the communities and history behind it.
Explore the history of New Orleans Second Line parades and Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs and discover how music, mutual aid and neighborhood traditions became intertwined.
Our episode exploring New Orleans’ hidden Black history and African American heritage examines stories that conventional tourism narratives have often overlooked.
You can also browse the World Footprints collection of New Orleans travel, history, music, food and cultural stories.
Continue the Take Me to the River Story
Visit the official Take Me to the River: New Orleans project for information about the documentary and the broader cultural preservation initiative.
Listen to the Take Me to the River: New Orleans soundtrack, including the Grammy-winning “Stompin’ Ground.”
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Take Me to the River: New Orleans?
Take Me to the River: New Orleans is a documentary and music project directed by Martin Shore that explores New Orleans and Louisiana music by bringing established and younger musicians together to create new recordings while examining the cultural history behind the music.
Did Take Me to the River: New Orleans win a Grammy?
A recording created for the project did. “Stompin’ Ground,” performed by Aaron Neville and The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, won Best American Roots Performance at the 2023 Grammy Awards. Martin Shore is credited as a producer of the Grammy-winning recording, and the Recording Academy lists Ian Neville with a Grammy win associated with the track.
Who is Martin Shore?
Martin Shore is a Grammy-winning filmmaker, music producer and musician who directed Take Me to the River and Take Me to the River: New Orleans. He also founded the Take Me to the River Education Initiative.
Who is Ian Neville?
Ian Neville is a New Orleans guitarist and producer, the son of Art Neville and a founding member of Dumpstaphunk. He produced and appeared in Take Me to the River: New Orleans.
Where can I listen to the Take Me to the River: New Orleans soundtrack?
The 26-track soundtrack is available through the project’s Bandcamp page and includes music created for the documentary, including the Grammy-winning “Stompin’ Ground.”
Full Transcript Below: Take Me to the River
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