What’s it like to perform at Jazz Fest for the first time? A local musician shares her experience.

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What’s it like to perform at Jazz Fest for the first time? A local musician shares her experience.

Shawan Rice and her band opened the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival’s Congo Square stage to an intimate crowd on Thursday (April 25), filling the air with funky guitar riffs and soulful horn sections. At one point, Rice spoke to the crowd before singing, “Flamingo Magic,” a song from her album “Fever Dreams” released in 2023. “It just touches on a specific feeling that I get when I first lock eyes with someone I haven’t had the pleasure o…