Bourbon Street, with its bars, restaurants and clubs, is known as one of the most popular places to hang out in the Big Easy. Found on this lively venue are many street vendors and musicians who provide entertainment, often for a few fleeting moments before the crowds move on and they’re forgotten.

“It wouldn’t be Bourbon Street without them,” said tourist Ashley Clower. Here is a sampling of the entertainers who have found a home on Bourbon Street:

I’ve got the blues

Troy Tallent has been strumming his acoustic guitar and blowing his harmonica on the same corner of Iberville and Bourbon for the past 23 years. He sits on a dark purple fold-out chair, earning about $50 a day playing the blues. Tallent has acquired a following of fans over the years. He says they love his music because it’s mostly original.

“Nothing to brag about, but I have been on this corner since ’87,” Tallent said. “I’ve played at all the clubs and done all the street things, but I play here ’cause I know so many people.”

Tallent said he moved to New Orleans because of its history. He wanted to become a musician and wasletting no one stand in his way.

“The girl I loved for 16 years turned into a lawyer, and I don’t like lawyers, and I don’t really need all that,” Tallent said. “So I told her that if she was going to be a lawyer, then I was going to be a musician. So I left California and headed to New Orleans.”

Beer cans and tap dance

Passers-by often hear Jamal Robertson and Robert Gooding before they see them. They sound like a herd of galloping horses with perfectly coordinated moves. People often stop and stay for their entire set and leave a few bucks or at least a round of applause.

Robertson and Gooding learned to tap dance from watching a YouTube video. On weekends, the friends head to Bourbon Street on the No. 88 bus and tap dance, but they don’t have proper shoes. Instead, they crush beer cans and attach them to the soles of their sneakers. They have to find containers that are already empty because neither of them is of drinking age.

Robertson is 15 and Gooding, 16.

“We find them lying down on the ground and we break them and tear them,” Robertson said. “Then we fold them and step on them.”

The two friends say they each make about $80 a night. They add that they make good grades in school and their parents are proud of what they do.

“We’re talented,” Gooding said.

Roses are red

Virginia Schrang sells single red roses on weekends for $4 each. She wears a white, form-fitting lace dress, with purple and green Mardi Gras beads around her neck. She sits with her legs crossed on her bar stool and offers a rose to anyone passing by.

“It’s a romantic business and I love it,” Schrang said.

Schrang says she was a commercial model in Miami for 14 years, but wanted to focus on raising her four daughters and two sons, so she quit her job to stay at home with her kids. She also has nine grandsons, five granddaughters and a pool of great grandchildren.

About 15 years ago, the 71-year-old attempted to make a living solely by selling roses, but said it wasn’t enough money to support a family.

“But once I got 62 and got my Social Security, then with the rose business and Social Security I was doing good,” she said.

However, the economy still hit her hard.

“We used to work five days a week, but as the [economy] goes up and down, now we only work Friday and Saturday,” Schrang said. “’Cause those are the only guaranteed nights we are going to make money.”

Golden talent

A gold-faced man lugging a stereo and a large bucket in a wheeled cart entertains on Bourbon Street every weekend. Daniel Poole, who goes by the name “Solid Gold” when he dances, wears jeans, jacket and shoes spray-painted sun gold to match his name.

He performs a mixture of hip-hop and break dance moves. When his shoulders pop and his hips swing from side to side, people get excited and drop money, mostly dollar bills, into his bucket. Although he has enjoyed boogieing on Bourbon for the past two years, he aspires to be a dancer spreading his Christian faith through his art.

“I feel like entertainers are those people to fill the voids in people’s lives,” Poole said. “When you entertain, don’t just rap, dance and play football and leave. Give me a message when you’re done. Anybody can just dance or just rap, but I have a message.”

Poole says he paints his clothing gold to be noticed. That way, he can network and spread inspiring messages to his audience.

“If you want to get noticed in entertainment when everybody is running one way, run the opposite way,” he said. “You got to do the unthinkable to make it, because so many people are doing the same thing. I thought I would promote myself by being gold on the streets of a heavily tourist city. I can meet more people like that.”

Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.