New Orleans Bash - eLivermore.com

eLivermore.com - By Bill Nale

Bothwell Center - New Orleans Bash 2013
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The New Orleans Bash at the Bothwell was held on February 8, 2013.
It was an evening of costumes, great music, New Orleans food and drinks, and lots of dancing.

French Quarter decor, Louisiana style cuisine, Hurricanes, live New Orleans jazz and more was featured. Artists, set designers, decorators, mask artists, volunteers and excellent musicians all join in the effort to make it a special night, creating everything from a Pirate's Corner Bar with mast and sails to a street party setting in "Jackson Square" and 8' wide masks suspended high on the 30' walls.

A Bourbon Street-style souvenir shop allows revelers to purchase masks, beads, boas and trinkets to deck themselves out, Mardi Gras style. Helpers also transform the West End to create a "Preservation Hall Experience", a tribute to the small famous jazz club just down from Bourbon Street in New Orleans' French Quarter that honors the birthplace of jazz. Big Money in Gumbo, performed two “Preservation Hall Experience” concerts in tribute to the original, has been hailed as a "New Orleans-drenched jazz and R&B (band) that can cover everything from Louis Armstrong to Professor Longhair.” Following the Preservation Hall Experience jazz concert, the band joined the other Big Money in Gumbo members in "Jackson Square" and provided a lively party, New Orleans-Style. The NOLA Bash was started as a fun way of fundraising to keep rental costs low for the nonprofits and others that use the Bothwell for cultural arts classes and activities, and it has taken on a life of its own. Artists and decorators jump in to make the party more authentic and the decor more outlandish each Bash, from paper mache' gators to jesterheads, with a fun following of regulars who get up and dance the longest Conga line in Livermore, threading through the building and crowding the dance floor. This is the fifth New Orleans Bash at the Bothwell, and is now a biannual event, complemented by Zydeco dances throughout the year.