Hard to imagine Preservation Hall had only been around just under 50 years after its intentional, benign neglect (including some extra wear-down for a Steve McQueen film). I remmeber standing on the boards before the windows, hearing the band roll through "Sweet Georgia Brown."

No Doubt headlined the main stage with much to prove. Gwen Stefani rode piggyback on a large man, then climbed up to scaffolding singing "Sunday Morning." I can still hear the crowd singing the first verses of "Don't Speak." Pure magic solo Stefani and the Harajuku girls could never top.

An American national treasure...and what better place to him than at New Orleans Jazz Fest. I had the honor in May 2004, seeing his quartet run through "Sunny Side of the Street," and the eternal "Take Five." This would be my final Christmas gift to that same former girlfriend, who was by then serving overseas in the military.

Two years later brought a new love to New Orleans for Jazz Fest 06. Keith Urban, then approaching superstardom, headlined the Friday afternoon performance and brought a huge teenage fanclub, which he burrowed right through singing "Better Life" among others. Another classic slow dance to "Tonight I Wanna Cry."

Saw these spirit-filled men at New Orleans' House of Blues Saturday evening, making a getaway on bikes while Jimmy Buffett's crowd tried to curl out of the race track. One of the finest concerts I've ever heard, their reinvention of "Amazing Grace" to the theme of "House of the Rising Sun" made two classic folk songs a fresh, eternally new pop song which stayed in your heads weeks afterward.

What drew my beloved to come with me...the chance to see the Gulf Coast's bard live and personal with his traveling medicine show and human aquarium. It almost fell victim to rain, but Jimmy opened with "City of New Orleans" as the sun broke through the clouds. 90 minutes of a good time that healed, the opposite of Bruce Springsteen's angry hootenanny preacher of the week before.