New Orleans Left Roseville Businesswoman With The Blues on Bourbon Street

My husband and I visited the ‘Big Easy’ for the very first time this summer. We only had a weekend and were looking forward to walking through the French Quarter, down famous Bourbon Street and touring the Garden District.

Bill, who plays electric guitars, was hoping to immerse himself in jazz and blues music anticipating that the sounds would be surrounding us everywhere we walked on Bourbon Street and in the French Quarter.

The official neworleansonline.com Web site tells you that ‘New Orleans is one of the world's most fascinating cities. Steeped in a history of influences from Europe, the Caribbean, Africa and beyond, it's a brilliant mosaic of culture, food and music. You'll find brimming bowls of gumbo, late nights in jazz clubs, strolls through historic neighborhoods and tantalizing festivals throughout the year. Come down and experience one of America's most culturally and historically rich destinations.’

I will totally give them thumbs up on the ‘stroll ability’ in the Garden District, every corner you turned, one house was more beautiful, charming, quirky or regal then the next. It made you wonder what the people did that lived behind the wrought iron gates or had homes that took up any entire block. Are there any kids living in the Queen Anne, whose beveled glass windows cast a kaleidoscope of jeweled colors outside, courtesy of the hanging chandelier in? Do you think they’d be allowed to run through the foyer and play in the parlor? I was kind of thinking no on that score.  

We would have spent more time there but the rumbling thunder gave way to a down pour and since we had no umbrella nor the cheap plastic ‘French Quarter’ logo’ d rain gear like every other tourist in the area, we ran and hopped the trolley car to downtown. With proper planning we could have searched out the homes owned by Sandra Bullock, John Goodman and Nicholas Cage.

We were thisclose to seeing Brad Pitt or at least his house in the French Quarter. We had a conversation with a man who had come upon a crowd of cameramen and TV crews standing outside a large home in the French Quarter the day before. When he asked what everyone was doing, an old timer said, “They’re all waiting for Brad Pitt to come out. That’s worth a buck or two but if he comes out with a kid the price skyrockets.”

I can not imagine living that way but freely admit I would have totally gawked if he would have appeared. We did, however, walk by the house featured in his film “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button’ in the Garden District. I knew that for a fact because I eavesdropped on a couple of ladies with a laminated white plastic map of unique homes in the area. They also had umbrellas.

We ate at some great restaurants, Brennans, Muriel’s and one that we loved so much we went back twice - Galatoire’s on Bourbon Street. The shrimp remoulde and salmon appetizers we had at a reception were to die for. I am not kidding. When the waiter had passed the shrimp platter once he set it on a side table, I went over and stood beside it and popped one shrimp after another into my mouth until I figured I had to stop or someone was going to cut me off. Besides, I needed to have more of the salmon appetizers and the waiter suggested I also try the fried eggplant strips that you dip in béarnaise sauce, then drag through powdered sugar. No lie. They were amazing.

And then we went outside to walk down Bourbon Street.

Again, the official neworleansonline.com website states:  "Although this historic French Quarter street has a bawdy reputation due to the burlesque clubs and all-night partying, come experience a whole other side of Bourbon Street steeped in history, folk lore and beauty that dates back to 1718 when New Orleans was founded by Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville.‘

We were hard pressed to find history, folk lore and beauty amongst state-fair size crowds, rock and roll music, strip clubs, 3 for 1 drinks and lots and lots of intoxicated people.

Bill searched block after block for jazz and blues clubs but all you heard was one rock band after another blasting music from open doors. Further down in the ‘burlesque’ section scantily-clad young girls tried hard to entice guys in to watch them ‘perform’. 

Everywhere you looked were advertisements for 3 for 1 drinks, girls selling plastic test tube shoots, voodoo shops, sex shops and, in some places, homeless men sitting on curbs with a bottle in a brown paper bag in their hands. Or those with no money simply picked cups off the window sills or retrieved them from overflowing trash cans to drink whatever was left inside.  

I fully believe at one time Bourbon Street was alive with great Jazz and Blues clubs, as well as history and beauty. I also think you could have wandered down the street for hours going in and out of clubs and probably find yourself a wee bit tipsy having not only overindulged in the wealth of musical offerings in 14 blocks but drinks as well.

I bet all of Irvin Mayfield’s clubs are still true to jazz as he strikes me as a very intelligent, passionate and professional musician who is true to his musical roots. We were lucky to catch a couple of sets at Irvin Mayfield's Jazz Playhouse inside the Royal Sonesta Hotel on Bourbon Street.  Big Al Carlson at the Funky Pirate has an amazing voice (and is really, really big) but he finished his set singing dirty nursery rhymes and asking a young woman to show him her ‘tits’ before requesting she carry a plastic jug through the audience for tips.

I think commercialism and the quest for profit may have ruined Bourbon Street.

Bar owners do not seem to think young people would appreciate jazz and the blues over loud rock and roll or Karaoke.  I would bet they are probably right. After all what 21 year old or 31 or 41 or 51, after indulging in 3 for 1 drinks, shots,  or ‘Hand Grenades” and “Hurricanes” (both billed as the most potent drinks on Bourbon Street) could appreciate jazz, as defined by Answers.com: ‘ A style of music, native to America, characterized by a strong but flexible rhythmic understructure with solo and ensemble improvisations on basic tunes and chord patterns and, more recently, a highly sophisticated harmonic idiom.’