Amédé Ardoin / Dennis McGee

Amédé Ardoin 1898-1942

Dennis McGee 1893-1989

Proud of his singing, accordionist Amédé Ardoin always carried a lemon in his pocket

to keep his voice strong, clear, and true. Among the first Louisiana Creole musicians

to have a professional recording career, Ardoin recorded 30+ songs from the

1929-1934 sessions, representing but a small part of his repertoire. Fiddler Dennis

McGee, the Honorary Dean of Cajun Music at UL Lafayette (1982), called Ardoin, "une

chanson vivante" or "a living song." Ardoin and McGee not only recorded together

when others did not, they played regularly together for Black and White dances

despite the strict Jim Crow segregationist climate of that time. Together they mingled

the deep multiracial roots of Louisiana French music, laying the foundation for what

we now experience as Cajun and Creole music. A racial assault later left Ardoin with a

traumatic brain injury. He died in the Central Louisiana Hospital in Pineville, LA. This

site honors these legendary Creole and Cajun musicians for their practice of inclusion

and creativity, their brave, expansive sense of community, and their belief in the value

of the clarity, strength, and power of the human voice.