Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Robert Pattinson Sings the Blues (+NEW Picture From the Vanity Fair Shoot)



Sing us a song, piano man—let’s start with “Happy Birthday.” New Orleans’s Preservation Hall—where Annie Leibovitz shot young Robert Pattinson, shown tickling the ol’ 88 with the world-famous Preservation Hall band—celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Situated in the French Quarter, the music venue is one of the country’s most hallowed: it was founded in 1961 for the purpose of preserving New Orleans–style jazz, and indigenous American music. On his first-ever visit to the Quarter, Pattinson jammed with the house band and thoroughly held his own—his celebrity perhaps subsumed by that of the musicians, whose legendary status awed everyone on set. “When we first started, none of us knew that Robert really does play piano,” says Ben Jaffe, the tuba player (center, above), the band’s director, and the son of the venue’s founders. “But when he got up there, he started ticking out these notes, and it was obvious he wasn’t just tinkling—he really knew how to play.” Though the musicians were expecting the actor to just pose, Pattinson gamely jammed along with their tunes. After finishing a song, he leaned over to Jaffe “and said, ‘That’s the first time I’ve played with a group of guys like that,’” Jaffe recalls. Not a shabby gig—especially with Jaffe’s homemade red beans and rice waiting as reward.

On the landmark birthday, Jaffe says he and the rest of the band are humbled: “It’s really momentous for us to reach this moment in our history, considering everything New Orleans has been through in the last five years,” he says. “It’s really a testament to the strength of the people of this city.” Preservation Hall endured a several-month hiatus post-Katrina and reopened in May 2006, structure miraculously intact. We say miraculously, because the hall’s charm is that it looks as though it might collapse at any moment—it’s one big happy jalopy of a 350-year-old structure, with all the glorious paint-peel-y, rusty-hinged patina of a Clementine Hunter painting. It strains at the seams with ambiance. And we hope, lack of air conditioning and all, that it never changes.


Vanity Fair | Via

7 comments:

  1. I would love to see a video of that jam session and hear how Rob did playing with the jazz musicians. That would be amazing.

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  2. I can't say how much I LOVE that Rob is an awesome musician. Le sigh...

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  3. I can't say how much I LOVE that Rob is an awesome musician. Le sigh...

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  4. What a charming story...would love to visit Preservation Hall!

    Can we get a vid of the jam session...I would love to hear it in all its glory! ;0

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  5. In one of his future projects we need to see Rob either play guitar, piano or both. It would be thrilling to see the man play music and act at the same time, not like "how to be" where he was suppose to be awful, but either in a biography or movie about a musician would be sweet music to my ears.

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  6. Ok I'll be satisfied with the sound. But pretty please.... let there be a recording about it!
    Hugs for everybody.

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  7. Totally agree with you @Iluvthemovies..all of us would be on seventh heaven if Rob does..and @twmmy..yes,hope they have a recording of that session..hugs to you as well and to all the other favs..especially that one from 'Argentina'!!missing you!

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