Doctor's in da house, chère

New Orleans piano icon Mac Rebennack, better known to the world as Dr. John, has become such a fixture of that city's vast musical heritage that you'll often hear him referred to in the same breath as Louis Armstrong, Fats Domino, and Professor Longhair -- his esteemed Big Easy predecessors. Indeed, Rebennack has been tapping the keys and singing in his soulful rasp for five decades, flavoring his Louisiana R & B and funk with African, Indian, and Creole influences.

His biography is almost as exotic as his music. He started out backing New Orleans artists on piano and guitar, developing a nasty heroin addiction along the way (which he kicked decades later). He did a stint in Los Angeles as one of producer Phil Spector's session men and eventually landed the role of piano player in Sonny and Cher's band (it's hard to believe, but they were hot back then). By the late '60s Rebennack had begun to develop his Dr. John persona, a character based on a 19th-century New Orleans Bambarra prince who was heavily into voodoo and the occult -- subjects Rebennack never tires of. Sonny and Cher gave him free studio time, which would result in his classic 1968 debut, Gris-gris.

Speaking with the man, whom I caught up with by phone last week in New York City, is a lesson in street jargon and old-timer slang. His heavy, cool-cat accent -- a dry, gritty, lazy Crescent City slur -- tends to blur words and phrases so that it's nearly impossible for the uninitiated to catch everything he says. He is unlikely to pronounce the "th" sound; and he is a master of the non sequitur, going with whatever flow his mind happens to latch onto.

Pasatiempo: I don't remember you playing Santa Fe in the past few years.

Dr. John: We played there last year, I think. Or Gallup maybe. I rarely remember where da hell we was giggin', and where it was and all. I remember we was in New Mexico last year during the election 'cause both the candidates was in the same hotel as we was stayin' at.

Pasa: Oh yeah, Albuquerque.

Dr. John: Yeahhh, Albuquerque. OK, I was wrong and you was right. You feel better?

Pasa: Uh, not really.

Dr. John: I jus' jokin' you.

Pasa: I know. The last time I saw you was at Telluride. Will it be a similar setup? What kind of material will you draw from?

Dr. John: Same group as at Telluride, a quartet. Every night we play a completely different set. We got 200 songs in da book to choose from. I don' know which ones you suckers will like, but it'll be a lot of funk. No matter where we playin', we like to see people shakin' and groovin'. Dat's our job.

Pasa: Any personal favorites?

Dr. John: I don' have much of favorite anything. I jus' like what I like when I like it. Whatever moves you at a certain time. And it shifts gears. So either you shift gears with it or you don't, and dat's kinda what life is like. ... You right there in that area of New Mexico where there's a lot of sacred things around and about you. And all around is all of da vibes of your ancestors and dead ancestors, and it's a powerful thing. And as long as you open, you can feel all kinds of things from da spirit kingdom, and it's your job to enjoy 'em. Dat's what we do with music -- it's a cross between da spirit kingdom and us here. And it's our job to enjoy it.

Pasa: You're playing a lot of performing arts centers now, with polite audiences. Is that a weird match for your grittier style of music?

Dr. John: Don' matter to us. You know what? We tell da security dat if dey wanna dance, let 'em dance. If dey just gonna be sittin', how we gonna know if dey gettin' their money out of us? Dem old-school New Orleans guys dat brought me up in dis racket said you gotta play and make da people have a good time. It's our job to make people feel it. Something I heard Earl King say once -- when you on the stage you a kind of doctor-and-Jekyll kind of guy, 'cause we ain't playin' da music, it's playin' us. And when you doing dat, da energies is gonna lift the people up, and den da people gonna lift us up, and it's gonna be gooood.

Pasa: You made some interesting choices on your latest record, like recording "When the Saints Go Marching In" and a lot of other New Orleans standards. Seems like New Orleans musicians go out of their way to avoid songs they've done and heard a thousand times.

Dr. John: "When da Saints Go Marchin' In" -- I did it like you'd do it in a spiritual group in church. Ain't nobody else done it like dat.

Rebennack then detoured into a strange sermon about mystical ceremonies of New Orleans church services, liberally peppered with interesting facts about voodoo. But he slurred and jargoned so much it was impossible to follow him. We talked more about his latest record, N'Awlinz: Dis Dat or d'Udda (Blue Note, 2004), a slickly produced collection of traditional New Orleans songs, some fine funk tunes, and a few cuts with celebrity guests (Willie Nelson, B.B. King, Randy Newman, and others) that tend to dilute the record's power. Rebennack is hazy on the details of recording. He claims not to remember much when things go well. It's when "things go whacked" that he remembers the most.

Pasa: So tell me a story about when things go whacked.

Dr. John: I remember we was playin' a gig on a Dutch TV show, and I had dis girl dancing nude with us, and dey showed it on TV. I thought dat was kind of hip for dem on Dutch TV to show dat show. I remember on dat show someone in one of da bands got electrocuted and died. Everyone thought it was part of the show. ... It made us a little nervous. But dat's da kind of weird stuff you remember back in the game.

And I remember another one back in the game, a guy named Iggy and da Stooges.

Pasa: Yeah, he's crazy.

Dr. John: [Laughs a long, deep, chuckly kind of laugh] I remember he jumped off da stage head first about 17 feet up and he hit da ground, splat. He thought da people was gonna catch him. Dis guy crawled back onstage on some ropes, and I guess he was a little dizzy from it. We was laughin' hard. Den he was spinnin' the microphone around and hit his drummer in da head with it. Den he was spinnin' the microphone some more and he hit himself in da head with it. We was laughing so hard we could hardly play. I was playing with him another time and he didn't remember none of it. But dat's da kind of stuff you remember back in da game.

Pasa: You've been in the business since the '50s. Is there anything you haven't done yet that you'd like to do?

Dr. John: Like to tour in South Africa.

Pasa: I hear there's a great audience for American roots music in Africa.

Dr. John: Oh yeah?

Pasa: Tell me what's in your CD player right now.

Dr. John: I'm listening to Chuck Carbo singing a song right now. He sang with the Spiders. You know, dat's how the Beatles got the inspiration for their name, from the Spiders. So they was listenin' to some New Orleans music.

Pasa: I didn't know that.

Dr. John: Most cats don' know dat.

Here he branched off into a history of the Spiders and the band's relationships to other New Orleans outfits. The man is a veritable encyclopedia of the musical history of his beloved city. It seemed odd that he now lives in New York City.

Pasa: Why did you move to New York from New Orleans?

Dr. John: I live more on the road than anywhere. After my last divorce, my grandchildren needed a little spot, and so they got my old crib. But I still consider New Orleans home. Q

details

Dr. John and his band

7:30 p.m. Sunday, April 10

Lensic Performing Arts Center, 211 W. San Francisco St.

$34-$47, 988-1234