Obituary: Lionel Ferbos
Centenarian jazz musician Lionel Ferbos died just days after celebrating his 103rd birthday.
NEW ORLEANS — Centenarian jazz musician Lionel Ferbos died Saturday at his home in New Orleans, just days after celebrating his 103rd birthday on July 17.
His granddaughter, Lori Schexnayder, said the trumpeter she called “Paw-paw” died peacefully, surrounded by friends and family.
Mr. Ferbos performed all over New Orleans and its suburbs for decades. His ability to read music made him an in-demand musician for gigs that took him to parks, schools, churches, dance halls and even prisons. He also performed at his 102nd birthday party and at every New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival until this past year.
Mr. Ferbos was believed to be the oldest working jazz musician, performing regularly until last year. He was also the last living member of the WPA band, which was formed during the Depression by laborers in the city’s Works Progress Administration.
He had recently become too weak to hold his trumpet, but family members would occasionally hold it to his mouth so that he could blow into it, Schexnayder said.
“He missed it so much, but his arms just weren’t strong enough to hold it up,” she said.
“He was very advanced and technical for his time,” said Dixieland jazz musician Lars Edegran, who performed with Mr. Ferbos for decades with the New Orleans Ragtime Orchestra, a group formed in the 1960s to revive the old music unearthed in the jazz archives at Tulane University. “He was very professional on stage, a beloved person, and there’s just nobody else like him.”
Mr. Ferbos married a Creole seamstress named Margarite Gilyot in 1934 and they remained married for 75 years — until her passing in January 2009.
“He was a hard worker, a family man and a wonderful husband to my grandmother,” Schexnayder said. “Everybody loved him.”