I love a live show and I like making pretty pictures. As an editorial entertainment photographer for one of the country’s premier photo agencies, I have developed my own unique style of performance portraiture, be it musicians performing on stage, Mardi Gras Indians masking in the streets of New Orleans or Social Aid & Pleasure Club members parading on a Sunday afternoon.

My intention is to capture the energy—whether it’s the split second a beautiful stage light falls on the subject or the raw emotion emanating from the performer lost in a groove. Capturing that moment is what counts most. I am a fixture in night clubs and arenas, at music festivals and on red carpets, but I am also trusted backstage, during private recording sessions and at funerals to document intimate and candid moments. The camera is my instrument.

My work is regularly featured in a number of music publications and newspapers, including Rolling Stone, Billboard, Entertainment Weekly, Country Weekly, People, Time, and DownBeat, as well as the New York Times, USA Today, The Times-Picayune and The New Orleans Advocate newspapers. I am a staff photographer at the legendary Tipitina’s, UNO Lakefront Arena, and The Saenger Theatre. I have had works accepted into the Smithsonian’s Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, Louisiana; the Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale, Mississippi; the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Museum in Cleveland, Ohio; and the George and Joyce Wein Jazz & Heritage Center in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Erika Goldring is a New Orleans artist living and working in the Freret neighborhood.