Michael C. Ford (reads excerpt from Thou Shalt Not Kill) - “Poet, playwright, editor, performing artist, and MC for this program: Introduction. "Since the age of 17, has plowed thru the Rexroth reading list he required of everyone to inspire their harvesting of a personal literary career. My rather quiet career has not been without invasions from a series of College English Dept. locusts."

Morgan Gibson  (reads I-Thou Poem for Kenneth Rexroth’s Centenary) - Since 1950 Morgan Gibson has published poetry and prose, two books on Kenneth Rexroth (one winning a CHOICE Award), two Buddhist books from White Pine Press, and two short plays. His countercultural essays have been about Henry Miller, Gary Snyder, Michael McClure, Paul Goodman, the Lebanese poet and artist Etel Adnan, besides Ginsberg and Rexroth, the civil rights and anti-war movements, and a slew of isms. He taught in Amerika and Japan—about 20 years each–before retiring from teaching but never from poetry.

Kerry Tomlinson  (reads a personal essay) - Student of Kenneth Rexroth. Santa Barbara resident and poet, whose works include: Time Payment (Mudborn Press, 1978)  and Night Letter (Mudborn Press, 1982)

Lewis MacAdams  (reads Codicil) - Lewis MacAdams is the author of a dozen books and tapes and CDs of poetry, including The Poetry Room (Harper & Row), Live At The Church (Kulchur Foundation), News From Niman Farm (Tumbouctou) and Africa and the Marriage of Walt Whitman and Marilyn Monroe (Little Caesar Press). His poems have appeared in many anthologies, including The Young American Poets (Follette), An Anthology of New York Poets (Random House), The Coyote Reader (U. of California Press) and The Faber Book of Movie Verse. Over the last five years, the Blue Press in Santa Cruz has issued three new long poems, The River, Books 1,2 & 3 (2007), The Family Trees (with artist Kim Abeles) (2001) and A Poem For The Dawn of the Terror Years (2003).

Philomene Long  (reads Nicholos, The Experimental Dog by Raymond Queneau  translated from the French by Rexroth) – Long is an internationally published Beat Poet and film director.

Eloise Klein Healy  reads three Sapphos  from "Poems From The Greek Anthology translated by Rexroth – Healy is the author of six books of poetry: Building Some Changes (Beyond Baroque Foundation); A Packet Beating Like a Heart (Books Of A Feather Press); Ordinary Wisdom (Paradise Press/re-released by Red Hen Press); Artemis In Echo Park (Firebrand Books), nominated for the Lambda Book Award and released as a spoken word recording by New Alliance Records; and her collections from Red Hen Press, Passing and most recently, The Islands Project: Poems for Sappho. The Inevitable Press published her chapbook Women’s Studies Chronicles in the Laguna Poets Series.

Aram Saroyan  (reads Autumn In California) – Saroyan is an internationally known poet, novelist, biographer, memoirist and playwright. His poetry has been widely anthologized and appears in many textbooks. His COMPLETE MINIMAL POEMS received the 2008 William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America.  DOOR TO THE RIVER: Essays and Reviews from the 1960s into the Digital Age will be published by Black Sparrow/Godine in March 2010.

Bonnie Tamblyn  (plays & sings original music for excerpts from A Bestiary- Bonnie Murray Tamblyn was born to music.  Living on the road with her guitar for years, she gained the soul of the honky-tonk chanteuse. Bonnie stretched out into the field of folk-rock in the 60’s and 70’s and recorded her songs with many notable musicians on the Southern circuit; Duke Bardwell from Louisiana, Merel Bregante of Austin Texas and Al Garth from California, to name a few. In the 80’s her path took the turn of devoted mother and wife to actors and artists Russ and Amber Tamblyn. Yet Bonnie never left her music, and continues to play and write.

Sprague Grayden (reads excerpts from A Bestiary Bear, Deer, Fox & Wolf)- Grayden is an American television, film and theater actress.  An alumna of Barnard College and Columbia University.  Grayden has been involved in critically acclaimed shows (Joan of Arcadia, Six Feet Under, Over There, John Doe and 24). She often takes character roles that are eccentric or a bit different.

Bob Brandts (reads an intro by Rexroth about Patchen then reads The Body Beside The Ties by Kenneth Patchen) - "My sense of complacency rests clearly in the statutes of limitation, the poor memory of friends, the deaths of others and, oh yes, a working wife. And it was she who read aloud Rexroth’s autobiographic novel, as we motored down the west coast of  Mexico. That was the summer before Kenneth and I were both institutionalized at University of California Santa Barbara."

James Cushing (reads an excerpt from a Rexroth Essay published in Esquire Mag May 1958 entitled "Jazz and Poetry) - Dr. James B. Cushing is a College English Professor, teaching Modern Poetry at California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly) San Luis Obispo, and has been the host of the KCPR-FM (91.3) radio show "Miles Ahead" since 1997. Cushing has been a DJ since 1981, initially at KPFK, Los Angeles, then from 1986-1997 at KCBX, San Luis Obispo, and from 1997-present at KCPR. He is the only member of the Cal Poly faculty to appear in the punk-documentary "The Decline of Western Civilization," and has published three books of poetry.

Doren Robbins (reads For Eli Jacobson) - Doren Robbins’ poetry, prose poetry, and short fiction has appeared in over 100 literary journals, including The American Poetry Review, Sulphur, Exquisite Corpse and Poetry International. He has published critical essays and articles on Kenneth Rexroth, Gerald Stern, Phillip Levine, Larry Levis, Philip Whalen, Charles Bukowski and Carol Tinker among others. Eastern Washington University Press is the publisher of his two recent collections of poems, My Piece of the Puzzle, a PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award winner for 2008, and Driving Face Down, which won the 2001 Blue Lynx Prize. He has also published many limited edition small press books and chapbooks. He was co-founder of the literary magazine Third Rail. "A pantry man, broiler chef, book store clerk, and carpenter from 1967-1990, he has taught Creative Writing and English since 1991." Currently he teaches Creative Writing and Literature at Foothill College.

Uri Hertz (reads excerpts from Noretorp-Noretsyh on the Hungarian revolution) with piano and bass accompaniment - Uri Hertz launched Third Rail, a now-legendary international literary/arts review, with co-editor Doren Robbins, in 1975. Hertz took over sole editorship of the magazine in 1981 and edited the Third Rail Rexroth issue in 1987. He continues to edit Third Rail online at www.literatureandarts.com and is co-editing a new online Rexroth festschrift, with John Solt, which includes Hertz’s essay on Rexroth’s jazz-poetry, "The King is Dead. Long Live the King!" His own work in poetry & jazz with pianist Steve Correll and the late bassist, Glen Mont, was released as a CD under the title, Inner Cities, (Third Rail, 2005). Hertz’s Poems Torn from a Life was published by highmoonoon in 2008. He teaches English at Santa Monica College and resides in Los Angeles with his wife, artist Linda Haim.

Ruben Guevara (reads Rexroth’s translation of Pablo Neruda’s Serenade from 30 Spanish Poems of Love And Exile - Rubén Funkahuátl Guevara is a singer, songwriter, producer, writer, poet, performance artist, and impresario.  He made his mark in music with his 1970s band Ruben & the Jets, who recorded two albums on the Mercury Record label, the first produced by the legendary Frank Zappa.  In the early eighties, and again in the mid-nineties, he ran Zyanya Records, a subsidiary of Rhino Records.  At Zyanya, he compiled and released three albums in the 80s and two in the 90s, which featured Chicano rock artists, as well as rock en Español groups from Latin America and Europe.  He has composed a rock gospel cantata, created art videos and performance art pieces, provided music composition and coordination for movies and television, and put together shows featuring music and dance.  He has been aptly called a culture sculptor.

Carol Tinker (reads excerpt from Andromeda Chained to Her Rock the Great Nebula in Her Heart) with flute accompaniment - Carol Tinker was born. She’s a poet, a painter, the last wife of Kenneth Rexroth and, presently living in Santa Barbara. 

Brad Dourif  (reads The Advantages of Learning, Proust’s Madeleine, For A Masseuse and Prostitute) - Brad Dourif  is a BAFTA-winning and Academy Award and Emmy-nominated American film and television actor, best known for his roles as Younger Brother in Ragtime, Billy Bibbit in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Hazel Motes in Wise Blood, Grima Wormtongue in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and Doc Cochran in the HBO television series Deadwood.

Mariana Rexroth [reads Un Bel Di Vedremo(in memory of his mother during the German bombing of London), Advent , (and from The Lights in The Sky Are Stars for Mary)-A Sword in a Cloud of Light] - Formally Mary, the eldest daughter of Kenneth Rexroth.