Go Zydeco! Get Ready To Boogie With The Best When Cajun Band Brings Its Sound To Sandpoint

After a week of arctic weather, music fans around the Inland Northwest can thaw their bodies to the warm, jubilant melodies of zydeco and Cajun music at the Panida Theatre in Sandpoint on Saturday.

One of the genre’s hottest combos, Geno Delafose and the French Rockin’ Boogie, blows back into the area.

Delafose and company first showcased their talents in the area in September at Spokane’s Davenport Hotel. The band drew over 500 people, according to the show’s promoter, Craig Heimbigner. Not bad for its first time in the area.

Heimbigner expects even more people at the Panida Theatre.

Though zydeco and Cajun bands don’t make regular stops in Eastern Washington or North Idaho, the few zydeco concerts that do happen draw quite well.

“There’s an audience here,” says Heimbigner. “People love it.”

The promoter’s main motivation for booking zydeco is his love for the music, not simply to make a buck.

“It’s always fun to turn people onto it. If you can get them to go, they always have a good time,” he says. “I’m a zydeco fan, and it’s just fun.”

Heimbigner looks for two things in bands.

“I see if they have any real musicianship there; that’s important,” he says. “And then they have to have a big fun factor. Zydeco usually has both of those.”

And so does Geno Delafose and the French Rockin’ Boogie. Delafose’s aptly titled debut CD “French Rockin’ Boogie” attests to this.

At the remarkably young age of 25, Delafose, whose band hails from Eunice, La., has already racked up 17 years of performing experience.

Before fronting his own band, Delafose played in his father’s zydeco band, John Delafose and the Eunice Playboys.

Geno was only 8 when he joined the Eunice Playboys as a rub board player. Soon after, he became the backbone of the unit as the drummer.

Some years later, Delafose stepped out from behind the drum kit and started playing both the diatonic and piano accordions. He even sang some of the songs.

In 1994, shortly after leaving the stage, John Delafose, 55, died of heart failure.

After his death, Geno, schooled heavily in the Cajun and Creole music traditions, inherited the Eunice Playboys.

Taking over as band leader wasn’t an awkward transition for the youthful musician, who at that point was already singing a great deal of his father’s material.

To mark a new era, Geno changed the name of the band to Geno Delafose and the French Rockin’ Boogie.

Judging from the response to the band’s first disc, “French Rocking Boogie,” released just over a year ago, Delafose has adeptly picked up where his father left off.

Don Snowden of the Los Angeles Times gave the album, on the reputable independent label Rounder Records, four stars, the highest rating. He wrote: “His sparkling solo debut relies on the spirited verve of the band, augmented by punctuation from the Iguanas’ sax tandem on three songs. Geno’s vocal and instrumental delivery animates the arrangements on “French Rockin’ Boogie.’ “

Time Magazine remarked: “On his first album … he shows his ability to take the simplest melody and then, as he puts it, ‘add the lacing’ to turn a foursquare tune into a surging, syncopated dance.”

For those who are worried about ample dancing space at the Panida Theatre, Heimbigner says several rows at the front will be removed so people will have plenty of room to waltz, two-step or just bounce around.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: Cajun fest Geno Delafose and the French Rockin’ Boogie will perform at the Panida Theatre in Sandpoint Saturday at 8:30 p.m. Tickets: $10, available at Street Music in Spokane and Java Adagio in Sandpoint.