Laveau Contraire, photo by Sophie Ormond

Burlesque in the Bayou: Decadence Drags Queer Magic Across the Quarter

07:00 August 28, 2023
By: Rowan Roudebush

New Orleans' Southern Decadence

The five-day event fills French Quarter venues with costumes and partying with performers and patrons ready to watch the gender binary dissolve into a spectacle of music, comedy, dance, and debauchery.

The New Orleans' drag community amazes visitors and locals year-round, but the first week of September is unlike any other time in New Orleans' cabarets. The abundance of gigs gives performers more creative freedom and makes room for new queens. Jahireen, better known as Qween Quan in their burlesque and drag performances, first got their start as a drag queen during Southern Decadence in 2019.

"I'm a Decadence queen. My first show ever was a Decadence show. I feel like that has rolled over into what I do, and how I got into being a burlesque performer because I've carried this sensuality and sexuality with me. I convey that in my numbers and my overall character as a performer," Jahireen said. "Treating Decadence as a second pride or a true pride is really everybody's goal. Pride Month is cool, but it's more a family and company thing. At Decadence, we get to be really wild and expressive."

Qween Quan, photo by Miles B. Jordan

New Orleans Drag and Burlesque

Zalia Beville, the owner of the Allways Lounge and Cabaret, said everything from live jazz burlesque shows to the Jockstrap Lube Wrestling tournaments, produced by Jahireen, happens during Southern Decadence. Jahireen said this variety is what makes New Orleans drag and burlesque special.

"In other places it needs to be a specific flavor of drag or a specific style of burlesque. Whereas here, there's so many opportunities because we just turn every building into a showroom," Jahireen said. "We have so much to offer and so many different styles of performing: sideshows, singing by performance, spoken word—all those things. Everybody can find something to resonate with, and see themselves in our craft."

In June, Jahireen received a proclamation from the New Orleans City Council for their work as a performer and queer advocate. Jahireen makes sure all bodies are welcome, and their goal is always making people feel seen. "I did a performance recently and there was somebody who came up to me after the show and said, 'Your second number made me cry because I just really, really felt seen and felt comfortable with what you were doing.' That's the goal. We want audience members to see themselves in what we do and then see themselves on stage," Jahireen explained.

These beautiful performances build on a tradition as old and fundamental to New Orleans as jazz. In the early 20th century, a new distinct Black American music first hit ears in the cabarets, dance halls, and brothels of New Orleans' old red light district, Storyville, where Louis Armstrong grew up.

After 7 p.m. in New Orleans, history comes alive. Queens take the stage in front of live jazz bands, and tell stories with bodies, songs, and props no one can anticipate. Aside from the striking cast of performers home to New Orleans, there is a tangible energy in these lounges that makes the performances so special. As Grammy-nominated musician and sixth-generation Ninth Ward native Stephen Gladney puts it, "You can't get better than the source."

"There's many jazz classics that go along with burlesque performances, because they were one in the same," Gladney stated. "You have those people still here, and you have that culture still going."

Gladney regularly performs and hosts the Cookout burlesque show every second Sunday. He said performing and improvising alongside burlesque dancers has pushed a different side of his creative expression.

"The beautiful moments happen when dancers are responding to a shimmer of something here, or they're honing into just the groove of the guitar. But it's a shared energetic moment, it's an exchange, and it's very creative," explained Gladney. "It definitely challenges me to allow myself to be seen, which goes into the queerness aspect and how perfect a platform burlesque is to portray queerness. "

Laveau Contraire, courtesy of Laveau Contraire

The New Orleans' Drag Community

The community of New Orleans drag and burlesque performers is as strong and deep as its history. Laveau Contraire, an acclaimed drag queen of New Orleans, describes them as sister communities. "There's always opportunities for performers to work together and help each other grow, and that's just on the stage, but then off the stage there's mutual aid. People share resources in ways that you would never expect. Someone had their bag stolen out of one of the bars that we work at, and everybody pitched in to help them pay their bills for the next month, so that they could get back on their feet," stated Contraire.

Today's performances honor the words of Louis Armstrong's 1947 Farewell to Storyville, "All you old-time queens from New Orleans, who lived in Storyville. You sang the blues, try to amuse, here's how they pay the bill. The law step-in and call it sin to have a little fun."

That's Decadence.


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