Thank You, Houston

To mark the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Surviving Katrina and Rita in Houston is presenting Thank You, Houston: A Celebration of Gulf Coast Voices, Music and Food. “No city in the country did what Houston did. And it hasn’t been recognized,” says SKRH project co-founder Pat Jasper. “Thank You, Houston is just one way to bring the people who helped and the people who were helped together.”

A storytelling project that asked evacuees to collect the testimonies of other evacuees, the first ever to do so on this scale, SKRH has recorded more than 400 interviews, and many of them will be available at listening posts at Thank You, Houston, along with portraits of survivors. That’s the “voices” part of the event. The music part includes the Bluebonnet Brass Band, a combination of New Orleans musicians who came to Houston both before and after Katrina, and Al “Carnival Time” Johnson, a Mardi Gras favorite who spent two years in Houston after Katrina before returning to New Orleans. And the food part is jambalaya and red beans and rice that will be available, organizers tell us, “for as long as they last” (which we’re gonna guess isn’t gonna be for long). 6:30 p.m. Discovery Green, 1500 McKinney. For information, call 713-400-7336 or visit www.katrinaandrita.org. Free.
Sat., Sept. 13, 6:30 p.m., 2008