Joomla theme for the New Orleans jazz institution

Joomla theme development for the Dukes of Dixieland, one of the United States' most decorated traditional jazz bands.

The Dukes of Dixieland are a New Orleans-based jazz institution with performances at the Kennedy Center, the Hollywood Bowl, and the Smithsonian. Their website needed to serve two audiences simultaneously: promoters evaluating the band for bookings, and fans purchasing music and following the tour calendar.

The engagement covered the custom Joomla template rebuild announced in mid-2009, replacing an aging fixed-width Joomla 1.x site with a redesigned build on Joomla 1.6 and a new custom template (dixieland). The rebuilt site launched mid-2011.

What the site delivered

• VirtueMart e-commerce: CD and box-set store with Add to Cart, product pages, and checkout: multiple titles including Deep South Blues and Fabulous Symphonic Jazz.
• GigCal tour calendar: Promoter-facing tour date listings in calendar view, kept current through the band's active touring schedule.
• Audio player: Flash-based NiftyPlayer for streaming audio tracks directly on the site.
• Hierarchical navigation: Fly-out dropdown menus (TransMenu/mod_swmenufree) across History, Discography, Symphonies, Reviews, Tour Dates, Merchandise, Fan Club, and Contact.
• Fan club signup: FacileForms-powered member registration integrated into the site architecture.

Stack and context

Joomla 1.6, custom dixieland template, jQuery 1.2.6, MooTools Core and More. VirtueMart for e-commerce, GigCal for touring, FacileForms for fan registration. Fixed-width layout, XHTML 1.0 Transitional, Flash audio, standard for a live entertainment site in 2010–2011.

The current site has moved to Bandzoogle (a music-industry SaaS platform), with the same content sections: History, Discography, Symphonies, Gallery, Music & Merch, carried forward from the custom build.