Joan's work is pious and religious, but metrically complex, with difficult strophes (Lo senhor qu'es guitz being an example).
His indiscreet cansos are dominated by courtly love, wherein the object of his affection is a woman known as Bel rai ("beautiful sunbeam").
In 1284 he wrote Quossi moria, a lament for the bloody incident that marred the feast of the Ascension in Béziers that year.
In 1286 he composed his most historically interesting work, Francx reys Frances, per cuy son Angevi, the metre and rhyme of which are identical to that of Peridgon's Trop ai etat mon Bon Esper no vi.
This was written in 1286, after the occasion of the Battle of Les Formigues in which Guilhem de Lodeva had been captured and imprisoned in Barcelona by the Aragonese, with which the French had been at war.