Preservation Hall Jazz Band have announced the release of their new album, So It Is, due out April 21 via Legacy Recordings. The record will mark the septet’s second release and will feature all-new original music, inspired by their 2015 life-changing trip to Cuba.

Bandleader/composer/bassist Ben Jaffe details the influence in this statement, “In Cuba, all of a sudden we were face to face with our musical counterparts. There’s been a connection between Cuba and New Orleans since day one – we’re family. A gigantic light bulb went off and we realized that New Orleans music is not just a thing by itself; it’s part of something much bigger. It was almost like having a religious epiphany.”

The music on So It Is, penned largely by Jaffe and 84 year-old saxophonist Charlie Gabriel in collaboration with the entire PHJB, stirs together that variety of influences like classic New Orleans cuisine. Longtime members Jaffe, Gabriel, Clint Maedgen and Ronell Johnson have been joined over the past 18 months by Walter Harris, Branden Lewis and Kyle Roussel, and the new blood has hastened the journey into new musical territory.

Inspired by that journey and reinvigorated by the post-Katrina rebuilding of their beloved home city, PHJB are redefining what New Orleans music means in 2017 by tapping into a sonic continuum that stretches back to the city’s Afro-Cuban roots, through its common ancestry with the Afrobeat of Fela Kuti and the Fire Music of Pharoah Sanders and John Coltrane, and forward to cutting-edge artists with whom the PHJB have shared festival stages from Coachella to Newport, including legends like Stevie Wonder, Elvis Costello and the Grateful Dead and modern giants like My Morning Jacket, Arcade Fire and the Black Keys.

You can listen to the new track for free right here.

So It Is Tracklist:

1. So It Is
2. Santiago
3. Innocence
4. La Malanga
5. Convergence
6. One Hundred Fires
7. Mad

Preservation Hall Jazz Band Tour Dates:

4/13 – Solana Beach, CA – Belly Up Tavern
4/14 – Indio, CA – Coachella Music Festival
4/17 – Seattle, WA – Neptune Theatre
4/18 – Portland, OR – Aladdin Theater
4/21 – Indio, CA – Coachella Music Festival
4/23 – Asbury Park, NJ – Paramount Theatre
4/25 – New York, NY – Highline Ballroom
5/7 – New Orleans, LA – New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival
6/9 – Manchester, TN – Bonnaroo
6/30-7/2 – Rothbury, MI – Electric Forest
8/5 – Kaslo, BC – Kaslo Jazz Festival