Fresh off a Grammy win, Buckwheat Zydeco Jr. is headlining Tucson Mardi Gras

The country’s biggest zydeco star, fresh off winning his first-ever Grammy Award, is spending Mardi Gras in Tucson.

Don’t ask David Slutes how he was able to pull it off, but Buckwheat Zydeco Jr. will headline Hotel Congress’s Mardi Gras celebration on Tuesday, Feb. 13, with the Ils Sont Partis Band.

Slutes inked the band into the lineup last spring, on the heels of its February 2023 Congress show.

“I saw Mardis Gras and I thought, well, the worst that could happen is they say no,” the Hotel Congress entertainment director recalled. “I’m not quite sure they were paying attention to the routing and date, but who knows.”

And who would have thought back then that the band would earn a Grammy in the best regional roots category. In a rare Grammy tie, Buckwheat Zydeco’s album, “New Beginnings,” split the award, handed out in Los Angeles on Sunday, Feb. 4, with the Louisiana Cajun band Lost Bayou Ramblers.

It was a first win for Reggie Dural (Buckwheat Zydeco Jr.), but a second Grammy for his band, Ils Sont Partis, which won a Grammy with Dural’s father, Buckwheat Zydeco (Stanley Dural Jr.).

Dural had played in his father’s Buckwheat Zydeco band since he was 17. A year after his father died in 2016, he started performing under the name Buckwheat Zydeco Jr. with his father’s longtime band and band leader Lee Allen Zeno.

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Since Slutes signed the band back in March or April, they released “New Beginnings” and garnered nationwide publicity. Then came the Grammy win.

“We could have made the case that they were America’s best zydeco band last year, but now they solidified it” with the Grammy, Slutes said.

Tuesday’s party at Hotel Congress, 311 E. Congress St., will feature themed food — shrimp po’boys, gumbo, muffalattas, King Cake cup cakes and jambalaya — and drinks including hurricanes, Sazeracs and Abita Beer.

In addition to Buckwheat Zydeco Jr., there will be a traditional second-line brass band snaking through the crowd, DJs, dancers and complimentary Mardi Gras beads.

The party starts at 5 p.m. and tickets are $20-$50 through hotelcongress.com.