There were 3 major venues in the massive area that had been blocked off for the festival. One area was for disco/oldies/drag shows called "Le Grand Bal Disco." Another at the upper end of Rue Berri was a fiesta Latina called "Cachondo" (which means "sexy" or "horny"). The third was Circuit boy heaven, "La Grande Danse."

All in all, DiversCite was an opportunity to physically enter different worlds.

Disco lives!

Le Grand Bal Disco featured several artists, including one of the founders of electronic dancer culture, . It was a real pleasure to hear such a legendary figure perform. For those who do not know their dance music history, Siano was the first person to continuously mix records together for an entire evening, and was one of Studio 54's original DJs. He also contributed to the techniques of "slip-cueing," the process in which a DJ matches up beats between records for a smooth transition from one song to another.

Siano gave us a fun-in-the-sun set, full of familiar oldies and lesser-known vintage classics preserved mainly by the Fire Island community.

I have suspected for a long time that disco was far from dead, and I was right. Young people still have theme parties where they play disco and dress up in disco-wear. More than a few people have a genuine love for disco music and the Fire Island morning music sound.

Le Grand Bal had plenty of older disco daddies and mommas. But there were also plenty of young 'uns dancing around as well. Hippy types especially get a kick out of it; I have no idea why this is true.

: totally Queer

Cachondo was its own world, featuring various performers and a DJ who spun Latino-Caribbean music for a crowd that was about 3/4 Latina/o. Everyone was welcome; the main difference between people had to do with who could sing along in Spanish.

One of the reasons I wanted to attend Divers/Cite was to see , the immensely gifted musician who hails from Oaxaca (Mexico), California, and Minnesota (she now lives just outside Mexico City).

If you ever, ever, ever have a chance to see this force of nature, do so. She first greeted the crowd in French, and then proceeded to sing and chat with us in French, Spanish, and English. Married to her fellow musician Paul Cohen, Lila is nevertheless Queer in the ways she subverts common stereotypes and barriers between folks.

She sang about Indians, affirmed the African, European, and Indigenous roots of her heritage, stood up for the rights of immigrant workers (many of whom come from her birthplace, Oaxaca), and channeled the spirit of a lizard. Now that's Queer!

For those of us who may wonder if Downs was an appropriate artist for Cachondo, a festival for the GLBTQA community, my answer is "Of course!" Lila is our ally, as evinced in her cover of the classic ballad "Cielo Rojo" (Red Sky). In her version, she sings about her love for another woman. Lila lives and breathes diversity, and we were blessed to have her with us.

La Grande Danse

I have been involved in the Circuit for almost ten years. I have attended parties all over the US and Canada. But I have never in my life seen anything like La Grande Danse.

Good God, the area occupied by dancers was the size of six (count 'em!) football fields. There must have been perhaps 35,000 people huddled together comfortably. This was not a sardine-fest like the NYC Pier Dance.

In every good party, there is a moment when the DJ transforms the milling crowd of strangers into a pulsing, unified mass. This moment in La Grande Danse happened thus: was playing Mr. Sugar's "Higher and Higher" (lyrics are my approximation)' target='_blank'>
I'm a hell of a girl
What can I tell you
Make you fell like a million dollars
Ooh, I'll take you high-higher
I'm the kind of a girl
Who'll satisfy you
I'm your Big Mac
Take a bite of me
Look into your eyes
Tell you who I am
Set your soul on fire
Get down on the floor
Wanna see you go (?)
Gonna take you higher and higher/higher and higher/higher and higher/higher and higher/higher and higher/higher and higher/ higher and higher/higher and higher

Grondin looped the phrase "higher and higher" again and again, building the intensity to a frenzied peak, and (unlike some DJs who feel the need to draw such things out ad nauseum) let it go at just the right moment.

Every transcendent dance-floor experience I had ever felt was reincarnated for me as we erupted all around me. I entered that "time out of time" that Victor Turner describes when he discusses communitas, the spirit-glue that binds humanity together in a "place out of place" that was Rue Berri, a cleared street in the middle of Montreal.

Divers/Cite is proof that the Gay community is much bigger than just the sum of its oppression. I recommend that everyone, especially civic leaders from the US, go to Montreal and see this annual miracle for themselves.