Treme (HBO) Filming Locations — The Show That Got the City Right

David Simon's HBO series *Treme* ran from 2010 to 2013 and did something most productions don't bother with: it filmed on location through post-Katrina New Orleans and hired local musicians to play themselves. Kermit Ruffins, Donald Harrison Jr., and Rebirth Brass Band all appeared as themselves — not as extras, not as consultants, but as working musicians doing what they actually do. The bars, music clubs, and corner stores you see on screen are real places, and most are still open. This matters in a city that lost much of its original population after Katrina in 2005, where what survived and what didn't became the story. New Orleans had been the largest city in the South at the start of the Civil War and remained a major destination for live music and its unique cultural heritage — but after the storm, the loss of much of the Black population affected the city's culture in ways that cannot be replicated by the influx of new groups. *Treme* caught the city in that gap: the music still happening, the places still standing, the people still here. Locals actually recommend the show as tour material — a rare compliment from this city. If you want to understand what rebuilt and what held, start with where they pointed the cameras.