Poetry Scores premieres musical settings of Newfoundland pub crawl poems

All the Clubs from Holyrood to Brigus #58, Brigus, Conception Bay (2007)
By Scott Walden
(Artist retains rights)

Poetry Scores will premiere the musical score of a pub crawl poem from Newfoundland at The Schlafly Tap Room on Saturday, May 30, along with a CD release by Nick Barbieri and a set of Old Time music by Dugout Canoe.

This free show starts at 9 p.m. with Nick’s set, followed by the Poetry Scores premiere at 10 p.m. and Dugout Canoe at 11 p.m. The Tap Room is located at 2100 Locust St. in downtown St. Louis and is a full-service restaurant and bar specializing in homemade beer. Poetry Scores is a St. Louis-based artist collective that translates poetry into other media.

A band of Poetry Scores veterans, with some newcomers, will perform new musical scores of “All the Clubs from Holyrood to Brigus,” a poetic sequence about Newfoundland pubs and the people who pass through them by Mary Dalton.

Mary Dalton's poem is itself a poetic score of a series of photographs of the same name (2005-2007) by Scott Walden.

"This series takes as its subject matter the bars and social clubs that line a 16-mile stretch of one of the oldest highways in Newfoundland, one whose communities have been buffeted by many of the major post-confederation changes: the new industries, the construction of the Trans-Canada Highway, the elimination of the Newfoundland Railway, the ‘70s-era emigration for high-steel jobs in the United States, the moratorium on the fishery, and the ‘90s-era emigration of youth to Alberta," Walden writes.

"As social centres in their communities, the architecture and demographics of the clubs reveal a contemporary rural Newfoundland that is a mixture of young and old, corporate and mom-and-pop, threadbare and shiny new."

The twelve poems in the sequence have been scored by local songsters Joe Thebeau, Michael Martin, Three Fried Men, The Lettuce Heads, Mike Stuvland, Ann Hirschfeld, Nick Barbieri, Mark Buckheit and Robert Goetz, plus a score by Eric Rose of San Francisco (co-frontman in the seminal 1980s Wash U campus band Butt of Jokes).

The Poetry Scores house big band performing the scores will include Perry Anselman, Nick Barbieri, Mark Buckheit, Steve Carosello, Heidi Dean, Eileen Gannon, Robert Goetz, Meghan Gohil, Ann Hirschfeld, Adam Long, Michael Martin, David Melson, Brian Messina, Mark Overton, Jon Parsons and Geoffrey Seitz.

The Lettuce Heads’ two scores will feature Fred Friction and Stefene Russell, respectively, performing Mary Dalton’s poetry over recordings of Lettuce Heads garage jams.

Mary Dalton
 

Before each of the scores, Mary Dalton will perform the poem being set to music, on video from Newfoundland produced specially for this event.

Mary Dalton has published five volumes of poetry, most recently "Hooking" (2013), "Merrybegot" (2003) and "Red Ledger" (2006). Her work has been widely anthologized in Canada and abroad and won many awards.

As the opening act at 9 p.m., Nick Barbieri will celebrate the release of his debut album “Poetry Scored.” The same augmented Poetry Scores all stars will back Nick performing his scores of poems by Andreas Embirikos (translated by Nikos Stabakis), Chris King, Josephine Miles and Albert Saijo, as well as a cover of “Midget’s” by St. Louis songster Chuck Reinhart and several songs with Nick’s own lyrics.

Nick Barbieri leading the Poetry Scores all stars
in their 2014 score of "Ten Dreamers in a Motel" by Josephine Miles

“Poetry Scored” has already been released by Hollywood Recording Studio and is available wherever music is downloaded or streamed - for example, on iTunes.

The night concludes at 11 p.m. with Dugout Canoe, arguably the greatest Old Time music band on the planet. Geoff Seitz, Dave Landreth, Marc Rennard and Andy Gribble are all legends in their own rights (and minds). Taken together, they are that much more legendary (and mental).

Dugout Canoe

Questions? Nick Barbieri, nickbedrock@gmail.com, or Chris King, brodog@hotmail.com.

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Download a PDF of “All the Clubs from Holyrood to Brigus” by Mary Dalton