Kermit Ruffins

New Orleans trumpeter, bandleader, singer, and songwriter Kermit Ruffins delivers inventive performances that radiate charismatic stage presence. Born in New Orleans in 1964, he often evokes comparisons to a contemporary Louis Armstrong, even if he has yet to attain the global ambassador status Armstrong achieved. As a fixture at contemporary New Orleans music events and the annual New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, Ruffins secured marketing and distribution support from the Crescent City’s Basin Street Records, which has released a consistent series of meticulously engineered albums featuring Ruffins and his Barbecue Swingers.

Ruffins did not grow up immersed in jazz or blues surroundings. Instead, his early listening centered on popular radio fare, including the Commodores, Al Green, and other acts that dominated Southern airwaves during the 1970s. He first took up the trumpet in his early teens, though jazz and blues remained unexplored until age nineteen, when he encountered Louis Armstrong’s music for the initial time. Soon afterward, he and a school friend began performing Armstrong numbers and other Crescent City-associated classic jazz material for tips in Jackson Square, the tourist district near the Mississippi River. Together with several classmates from high school, Ruffins formed the Rebirth Brass Band, which evolved into Kermit Ruffins & the Barbecue Swingers in 1992. That year he issued his debut album, World on a String, on Houston-based Justice Records, followed by Big Butter & Egg Man in 1993 and Hold on Tight in 1995.

Ruffins draws substantial crowds throughout New Orleans through his spirited sound and engaging platform manner. He is equally known for hosting frequent barbecue gatherings at the venues where he and his band appear. When conditions allow, he positions his grill on the sidewalk outside the club and offers barbecued chicken or beef to staff, fellow musicians, and audience members during the intervals between his customary three sets, which explains the group’s name. From the late 1990s onward he has remained a core artist on Basin Street Records, issuing albums such as Swing This! in 1999, 1533 St. Philip Street in 2001, and Big Easy in 2002.

In more recent seasons Ruffins and his ensemble have toured on summer weekends, appearing at festivals across Florida, California, Colorado, New York City, and Cape May, New Jersey. He has effectively served as an informal goodwill ambassador for post-Katrina New Orleans, linking the city’s traditional jazz heritage with a vibrant, modern sensibility on the 2013 release We Partyin’ Traditional Style, all conveyed with equal measures of respect and exuberance. In 2017 he collaborated with fellow New Orleans trumpeter Irvin Mayfield on Beautiful World, an album celebrating the twentieth anniversary of Basin Street Records.