Camel Toe Lady Steppers strut their stuff for a cause

Camel Toe Lady Steppers started with the costumes and ended with a great cause.

While the mustachioed, jean-short wearing 610 Stompers have gained a measure of notoriety, even parlaying their local popularity into a recent appearance in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City, a much fairer crew of steppers are steadily strutting into the collective consciousness of the Crescent City.

Born out of a humorous Halloween costume idea in 2003, the Camel Toe Lady Steppers are now one of the Krewe of Muses parade’s top attractions, while also doing good works in the community.

“We thought it would be fun to dress up as majorettes,” recalled Beth Manley, one of the Steppers’ founders, of that Halloween more than eight years ago. “We ordered these gold lame costumes. We got the tops and the boots and got a couple friends to play drums and make up some routines … and the name just kind of made itself.”

The original group consisted mostly of Tulane graduate students, but has since expanded to include 50 Steppers across a wide spectrum of careers and backgrounds, Manley said. “Some of us are professors and doctors and lawyers, we have business owners…it’s just an incredibly diverse group, and it’s an amazing resource – all really smart and successful women who also still know how to have a good time.”

“There are a lot of neat people in the group – entrepreneurs, burlesque dancers, etc,” said newly minted Stepper Liza Sherman, adding that “it’s been such a great experience to hit the streets of New Orleans in Camel Toe Lady Stepper costume, and feel the pulse and response of the crowd. As a first year Camel Toe last Mardi Gras and native New Orleanian, I had never experienced Mardi Gras like I did marching in Muses.”

During the off-Mardi Gras season, the Steppers involve themselves in several causes and events, such as the No AIDS walk, Manley said. And on January 27th at Tipitina’s, the Lady Steppers will be hosting their eighth annual fundraiser – with a theme of ‘The Best Little Toedown in Nola – with proceeds going to The Roots of Music.

“It’s an amazing program that was started by Derrick Tabb of Rebirth Brass Band and Allison Reinhardt,” Manley said. “It’s an after school music education program for middle school kids that was started right after Katrina because a lot of the middle school music programs had been shattered. They do after school tutoring, they have a music lessons and they have an amazing marching band, really, really incredible.”

While the Steppers are currently working on an official website, you can learn more about their organization and the upcoming fundraiser on the Camel Toe Lady Steppers Facebook page.

Writer and filmmaker Brian Friedman writes about New Orleans for NolaVie.