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Although Michael Doucet did not originally intend to pursue performing Cajun music, a turning point came when Doucet was awarded a Folk Arts Apprenticeship by the National Endowment for the Arts.

" I had planned to go to graduate school in New Mexico to study the Romantic poets ," he recalls on the Vanguard Records web site.

" Instead I traded William Blake for Dewey Balfa.

" Doucet sought out every surviving Cajun musician, including Balfa, Dennis McGee, Sady Courville, Luderin Darbone, Varise Connor, Canray Fontenot, Freeman Fontenot and others.

He studied their techniques and songs and encouraged some to resume public performances.