The night of Wednesday, Jan. 14, the Orpheum Theater in New Orleans, Louisiana, was abuzz with people expectant for a night of music with their favorite artist. Gregory Alan Isakov is a Colorado-based folk artist who has been making music for over two decades.<\/p>\n
Before the show started, Mason Tusa and Lily Dufour talked about their excitement for the show and their hopes for seeing Isakov for the first time. When talking about the singer-songwriter\u2019s music, Dufour said, \u201cIt\u2019s just so calming and peaceful, and just yearnful. Just good vibes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tusa was hoping to hear \u201cSan Luis\u201d and \u201cBig Black Car.\u201d Dufour was hoping for \u201cAmsterdam.\u201d<\/p>\n
New Orleans was Isakov\u2019s first stop on his winter 2026 tour. He played to a sold-out audience in what is being called \u201cAn Intimate Acoustic Evening with Gregory Alan Isakov\u201d by the concert\u2019s venue. The stage was simple, with red lighting, a couple of rugs, a stool, a piano and a few guitars.<\/p>\n
The show was a first for Sadie Knapp, who said that for her first concert, it was great. Knapp is in theater, so one of the things that stood out to her was the lighting and set design. The globes of light placed around the space brought color and tone to the intimate world of the stage.<\/p>\n
\u201cI pulled out my phone today at school to show my friends the lighting design,\u201d Knapp said.<\/p>\n
A few minutes after 8 p.m., Isakov walked on stage to rapturous applause. There was only a little lighting as he picked up his guitar and began to play \u201cAsh of Our Elders.\u201d Once the first song ended, he began to talk to the crowd.<\/p>\n
\u201cHello New Orleans\u2026 I\u2019ve been thinking about vampires all day long,\u201d Isakov said. He continued talking about how this concert was his first solo, \u201ckitchen table\u201d kind of show. \u201cI put it off for a long time \u2013 I just kind of thought it\u2019d be kind of boring. And then I was like, \u2018I love a boring show.\u2019 Thank you for coming.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emma Poloza, a long-time fan of Isakov\u2019s music, loved seeing him perform in person.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s my favourite singer, so I\u2019ve been raving about [the concert] all day,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m feeling wonderful!\u201d<\/p>\n
Isakov has been a familiar voice for Poloza ever since her \u201cacoustic phase.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone goes through a phase,\u201d she said. \u201cAfter my acoustic, soft music phase, he was the only one that kinda stuck around because I feel like his music is just very universal. It\u2019s very calming. So I still listen to him all the time, and every occasion I feel like his voice is just very natural.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her favorite part of the night was when Isakov brought out his brother, Ilan, to perform with him. Another moment she mentioned is how when the show ended, Isakov left the stage and then returned to do an encore. After all the applause, Isakov played once more for everyone.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was like a 10-minute song. It was beautiful,\u201d said Poloza.<\/p>\n
She continued, \u201cI think it\u2019s very powerful because music is totally a God-given talent, so I feel like the ability that he brought all those people together to just sit and listen to him with no theatrics was a very telling way how music brings people together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Evan Tassin is a senior history major at LSU, and he said that the quiet ambience of this performance was a stark contrast to the loud crowds he had encountered at other concerts.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt felt like it was just him playing with his friends,\u201d Tassin said. \u201cI felt like I was just sitting across the table from somebody, and they were just playing me a song.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tassin is a musician \u2013 he plays guitar and sings \u2013 so he talked about how he was also able to appreciate the performance from a technical standpoint.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was nerding out a little bit because just seeing [Isakov\u2019s brother Ilan] who played the guitar, and who would do a certain kind of picking style \u2013 I would kind of freak out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Throughout the show, the audience was practically silent until the end of each song, which was met with applause and cheers from all over. The night, in as little words as possible, was peaceful. Isakov\u2019s voice and music were sonorous, washing over the audience like a wave washing over sand.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of things were running through my head while I was watching [the show], because he plays a song and you\u2019re kind of just in it for that moment, which can\u2019t be said for a lot of artists,\u201d said Tassin.<\/p>\n
Tassin admires Isakov\u2019s music because he feels that the musician\u2019s sound has a quality that stands out in such an oversaturated genre like folk music. The singer\u2019s songwriting, when paired with his acoustic guitar and folksy banjo, is also able to paint fairy tale-like pictures in the listeners mind, said Tassin.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s not the first white guy that ever pulled on a flat brimmed cap and played with an acoustic guitar,\u201d Tassin said, \u201cbut the way he does it, you can feel it\u2019s authentic.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the night came to a close, Isakov received tons of applause and returned for an encore, playing \u201cBefore the Sun\u201d and covering his friend and collaborator Iron & Wine\u2019s song, \u201cThe Trapeze Swinger.\u201d Isakov received an immediate standing ovation from the theater full of fans, and he took his bows and left the stage.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source lsureveille.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The night of Wednesday, Jan. 14, the Orpheum Theater in New Orleans, Louisiana, was abuzz with people expectant for a night of music with their favorite artist. Gregory Alan Isakov is a Colorado-based folk artist who has been making music for over two decades. Before the show started, Mason Tusa and Lily Dufour talked about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2238891,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2238890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Gregory-Alan-Isakov-moves-fans-through-folk-music-at-winter.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2238890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2238890"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2238890\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2238892,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2238890\/revisions\/2238892"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2238891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2238890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2238890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2238890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}