Poetry Magazine Release Party: Billy Blake and the Vagabonds Live in Concert

Doors open at 6:00pm; performance starts at 7:00pm. Capacity is limited to the first 125 guests. Attendees will receive complimentary copies of the April 2012 issue of Poetry magazine and a limited edition Edie Fake print of “The Little Vagabond” by William Blake.

Songwriters Reid Coker and Kennedy Greenrod perform with musicians Saleem Dhamee, Jason Labrosse, Alan Scalpone, and Seth Vanek as “Billy Blake and the Vagabonds” for a concert of William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Billy Blake and the Vagabonds have created a thoroughly modern interpretation of Blake, drawing from folk, pop, country, and gospel music to New Orleans drum line with a Bo Diddely beat. Join Poetry editors for a debut of this song cycle, and for a reception before and after the show.

Come, eyes, see more than you see!
For the world within and the outer world
rejoice as one. The seminal brain
contains the lineaments of eternity.
     “Two Dicta of William Blake: Variations,” by Robert Duncan
       Poetry, December 1961

The band will also perform the following poems, which you can peruse beforehand on poetryfoundation.org:

Introduction to the Songs of Innocence
The Echoing Green
The Chimney Sweeper: A little black thing among the snow
A Cradle Song
A Divine Image
The Clod and the Pebble
The Little Girl Lost
The Chimney Sweeper: When my mother died I was very young
The Sick Rose
The Fly
The Tyger
The Garden of Love
The Little Vagabond
London
Infant Sorrow
A Poison Tree