I went to 1st day of Jazz Fest as a New Orleans local. Here’s what I spent on food, drinks.

In April 1970, the first New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival was held in what is now Congo Square, where the city’s own jazz clarinetist Pete Fountain headlined and nearly two dozen food vendors served south Louisiana cuisine.

Now, over 50 years later, half a million visitors — many wearing past years’ Hawaiian-style shirts — flood into the Fair Grounds race track for Jazz Fest. Hitmakers like The Rolling Stones, Katy Perry and Lizzo have performed on one of the 14 stages. And this year, over 60 vendors are serving both homegrown and international cuisine. 

But despite how vastly its grown over the years, the core of the festival has remained the same, bolstering the essence of New Orleans culture while keeping its finger ever so slightly on the pulse.

“We have helped give traditional music a place at the table in American popular culture,” Quint Davis, the producer and director of Jazz Fest, said in 2009.

Though its mission to preserve traditional music remains untouched, one element of the festival has changed drastically over the years: the prices. 

Ticket information

On Thursday afternoon at Jazz Fest, some locals strolling the race track reminisced the days of cheaper tickets — a classic conversation that emerges among New Orleanians at least once a year.

General admission tickets for the two Thursdays of Jazz Fest, dubbed “Local’s Day,” are discounted to $50 plus fees at the gate for Louisiana locals, which was the price of my ticket. For non-Louisiana residents, tickets are $105 plus fees at the gate.

Single-day tickets purchased at the gate for Friday, Saturday or Sunday of either weeked are $105 plus fees for Louisiana residents, while non-residents pay $135 plus fees. 

Food prices

At noon, the first food booth I stopped at was Gallagher’s Grill, a Covington-based steakhouse that also specializes in seafood, for the $10 fried crab cake with smoked tomato tartar.

It was complex in both texture and flavor profiles, given that the the crisp fried coating is paired with soft, subtly sweet crab meat and a smoky, liquid-like sauce.

Next came a dish cooked by Big River Foods that has become a staple among locals, visitors and even musicians who have performed at the festival. 

“Allen Toussaint was a big fan. Marcia Ball, Freddy LeBlanc from Cowboy Mouth,” Monica Davidson, the namesake of the famed Crawfish Monica, said in a 2018 interview. “We have a lot of fans. We’ve been really lucky.”

For $13, Crawfish Monica features corkscrew-shaped pasta thrown into a golden, cream pasta with succulent crawfish tails.

The last seafood dish I ordered was the $14 barbeque oysters at Brocato’s Kitchen, a booth that’s been catering at Jazz Fest for three years and recently opened its first restaurant location in Mid-City.

Sitting on a bed of airy French bread, the six oysters were fried not too soft, nor too hard, and were covered in the Worcestershire-spiked butter sauce that defines barbeque shrimp, though with a more earthy flavor.

White chocolate bread pudding made by Caluda’s, the Harahan bakery known for its crawfish strudel at Jazz Fest and king cake, was for dessert. The soft bread was submerged in a luscious white chocolate sauce that pooled at the bottom of the bowl. It costs $8. 

Outside of alcoholic drinks, what appeared to be the most popular beverage at Jazz Fest was the “blackberry breeze” iced tea — with a choice of honey-sweetened or unsweetend — being sold by Sunshine Concessions for $8. 

Overall price

The first day at Jazz Fest, including food and drinks with tax and tips, cost $59.96. With the ticket, the total was about $110.

While the costs have changed over the years, the festival’s mission remains the same as it always was.

Visitors went from stage to stage, carrying plates of red beans and rice and French bread stuffed with soft shell crab. The works of local artists James Michalopoulos and Brandan “BMIKE” Odums hung on display, near a band performing clattering zydeco music. Feathered Mardi Gras Indians and musicians tapping tambourines trickled through crowds, a performance that was added to the lineup in 2005.

“I guess that goes back to the weird old producer who grew up in the street at second-lines,” Davis once said. “But if we’re going to be a festival of the heritage of jazz and New Orleans, that’s the taproot. That’s the heart and soul. That’s who we are.”