NEW ORLEANS | It is Wednesday night in City Park and everything is still. Voodoo Fest will start in two days, but for now the unlit stages sit ready and primed. From Friday to Sunday the audience will throng in inebriated costumed mass to hear international mega-bands such as Kiss, Jane’s Addiction, Emminem, Lenny Kravitz and Widespread Panic.

Yet a smaller stage featuring local talent – The Bingo! Parlor – rises as a yellow and red striped tent at the entrance of the Voodoo Music Experience. Set among art installations and next to a small lake, the Bingo! Parlor combines influences of Tom Waits, “Hee-Haw” and Pee-Wee's Playhouse to produce a tent full of musical vaudeville, of strip tease, and of New Orleanian-ness. Local celebrity and co-founder of the Bingo! Parlor Clint Maedgen explains, “(The Bingo! Parlor) is something of a family reunion... It is fun to shine the light on our friends.”

The Parlor is now laid out and messy. Sound and light producers test and call into microphones. Maedgen and Bingo! Parlor Director Ron Rona introduce themselves and guide me behind the Bingo! Parlor tent to a smaller tent for our interview. While Bingo! Parlor is the realization of a dream Rona is excited for the future, “We're just getting started.... We can make Bingo into a touring experience.”

Maedgen agrees believing the local jazz/bohemia rock/brass band beat music scene can only exist in New Orleans. Maedgen relates, “The whole (sound) would be different were we playing in another city.”

But there are problems. Some local musicians feel slighted by Bingo! Parlor and Voodoo Fest. For the past 9 years the Land of Nod Experiment Stage showcased local talent at Voodoo Fest. The Bingo! Parlor is a relatively new stage compared to Land Of Nod Experiment. This year because of financial concerns Land of Nod Experiment was not included in the Voodoo Fest. Some musicians feel that Bingo! Parlor and Voodoo Fest chief Steve Rehage worked together to push Land of Nod Experiment out of Voodoo Fest by “stealing” musicians and getting them to perform at Bingo! Parlor.

Maedgen shakes his head at these accusations, “I was very, very sad to hear they (Land of Nod Experiment) are not performing. We hope they are here (at Voodoo Fest) next year. We're not about to try to bust up anyone else's show.” Rona states, “I love Dan Sheridan (Land of Nod director) and I have a lot to learn from him.”

The show will start soon. We all know that. All is calm now but it is picking up. An energy surrounds this City Park this evening. Halloween is coming to New Orleans and Voodoo Fest is the beginning of the spinning Big Easy carnival which can only end broken stringed and twisted during a Festival named after Jazz far off in May.