A trilogy of distinctive vignettes that peek into a notorious chapter of New Orleans history, the era of New Orleans’ legal red-light district, forms the basis of a show by musician and performer Esquizito. Three Vignettes of The District is an adaptation of Danny Barker’s book Buddy Bolden and the Last Days of Storyville, published shortly after Barker’s death in 1994. Performances will be staged at Cafe Istanbul, 2372 St. Claude Avenue, on Friday, March 18, at 8 p.m. and Sunday, March 13, at 5 p.m.

The era of Storyville was a period of time potent in its seductions and equally shuddering in its truths. Barker, a renowned jazz musician and raconteur whose childhood overlapped the final days of Storyville, wrote about the brothels, cribs, barrelhouses, gambling dens, honky-tonks and dives with colorful language and death-defying humor.

Esquizito has conjured up the notorious characters of The District by interpreting Barker’s “lies embellished with truth,” he said. “Beyond his varied career in popular American music, Danny Barker was a self-styled artist who viewed jazz in a broad cultural, economic, and social context. For him, jazz was a distinctive manner of expression, which is inherently reflected in virtually every aspect of Black lives in America.”

The two-hour performance with brief intermission marks Esquizito’s return to the stage of Cafe Istanbul.

“Esquizito is a mix of modern jazz vocals, New Orleans street character, traditional jazz and gospel, and a healthy dab of bohemian zaniness,” said Kalamu ya Salaam, a poet, author and filmmaker in New Orleans.

Tickets are pay what you can with a suggestion of $20. For more information, visit here.