The new year is an arbitrary demarcation – really January 1 does not look much different from December 31.  The marking of time is important to humans.  How do you mark a new year what does it mean.  In this service we will offer opportunities for reflection on the past year, a chance to “bury” whatever that was negative or hurtful to us in 2017, and looks forward with both hope and joy to this new year of 2018 now before us.   We will let go of the old year and look forward to the new year

The tradition of the New Orleans jazz funeral began its development in the late 19th century, combining European and uniquely American musical elements with a distinctly African sensibility. It can be safely said that the custom could have arisen no where else in America, or in the world, for that matter, for nowhere else but in New Orleans where the blending and fusing of a gumbo of cultures that gave birth not only to the jazz funeral, but to jazz itself—as well as to blues, Cajun and zydeco, rhythm and blues, and even rock’n’roll.

Topics: Intention