New Orleans-based music magazine Offbeat published a lengthy wrapup of Jazz Fest, and if you go to this link and scroll down to the heading “John Swenson,” you’ll see the bit of it that’s of interest to me:
Of the many traits and quirks that make up the eccentric and often occult nature of New Orleans music, shared repertoire is the most potent. McLuhan said that an archetype is a cliché that has graduated to mythic status by overuse, but there is an aesthetic difference in archetypal New Orleans material that is measured by the depth of the performance. Party anthems and Blues Brothers-style covers of 1960s R&B tunes are rampant on the Jazz Fest stages and often resort to the pandering banality of Bourbon Street tourist clichés. But there are touchstone songs of New Orleans whose meanings contain cavernous depths easily plumbed by musicians talented enough to recognize them as true archetypes.
One of the most powerful is “St. James Infirmary,” an ancient lament whose imagery of identifying the dead body of a loved one is chillingly contemporary in light of the thousands who drowned in the flood of 2005. This is one song that, in the right hands, can’t be overused.
Well said! The writer goes on to note that “three of the most effective performers on opening day included ‘St. James Infirmary’ in their sets within minutes of each other,” namely Dr. John, Trombone Shorty, and Van Morrison. The full description of how each artist handled the song is worth reading.
A couple of years ago I did some research into the song "St. James Infirmary," wrote up what I found, emailed that essay to friends and posted it on my web site (as part of a series of "Letters From New Orleans," as I was living in that city at the time). Based on the feedback, I wrote a second version of the essay, and asked for more feedback. Based on that, I wrote a 
