On Thursday, April 16th, 2026, Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser, the Louisiana State Museum, and the New Orleans Jazz Museum will unveil "The First Piano Professors and the Lost Music of Early New Orleans". An exhibit that reveals a groundbreaking lost chapter of New Orleans music history.
The exhibition explores the vibrant piano traditions of 19th-century New Orleans that helped lay the foundation for jazz and American popular music.
It also connects directly to the museum’s ongoing Lost Music of Early New Orleans initiative, a research and performance project dedicated to recovering and recording the city’s earliest piano repertoire.
Curated by pianist and archivist John Davis, the exhibition is the result of a three-decade search for rare keyboard works—many preserved only as printed sheet music. Through rare first-edition scores, historic instruments, and newly commissioned recordings, visitors will encounter music that has not been heard since its original publication in the 1800s.
“As a pianist whose performing career is rooted in archival work, I’m thrilled to curate The First Piano Professors and the Lost Music of Early New Orleans at the New Orleans Jazz Museum,” said John Davis. “The show is the culmination of a 30-year search for neglected keyboard works by an overlooked continuum of 19th-century Crescent City composers. These pieces survive in print thanks to the enormous music publishing industry that once lined Canal Street. The African and Afro-Caribbean dances, Mardi Gras pieces, banjo imitations, voodoo pieces, and brass band marches among them foreshadowed the New Orleans jazz and rhythm & blues that would emerge in the 20th century.”
The exhibition opening will take place Thursday, April 16, 2026, from 6:00-9:00 p.m. at the New Orleans Jazz Museum. The evening will feature live music, refreshments, and the first opportunity for the public to experience this rediscovery of early New Orleans musical culture.
For more information visit NOLAJazzMuseum.org
