Elysian Fields Forever: A John Lennon Birthday Tribute at Tipitina’s

On Thursday, Oct. 9, colorful local musician Davis Rogan will host a birthday tribute to John Lennon at Tipitina’s.

The show will feature a slew of hot New Orleans artists, including Paul Sanchez, Susan Cowsill, Alex McMurray, Jonathan Pretus, and Rogan himself, to name but a few.

The idea for the Lennon tribute was conceived of this past June, when illness forced ex-Beatle Paul McCartney to reschedule a highly-anticipated concert that was to be held at the Smoothie King Center.

Elysian Fields Forever: A John Lennon Birthday Tribute

Not to be deterred, Rogan quickly organized a group of other high-profile ticket-holding musicians to play the concert themselves, aptly dubbing it “A Little Help From My Friends.

Rogan categorizes the show, which attracted about 250 people, as a huge success.

Rogan and fellow musicians, who he describes as “a disparate group of people who were all friends but didn’t necessarily work together all the time,” brought down the house at the conveniently-available Howlin’ Wolf music club with impassioned covers of material from Macca’s Beatles, Wings, and his solo career.

Rogan said that because “the energy was so great, and the energy from the crowd was so great, and the room was so full,” they had decided before the show was over that they were going to be doing another one.

Lennon’s birthday is October 9th, and McCartney had rescheduled his show for the 11th, so the timing seemed perfect.

The songs played at this week’s Lennon tribute will be a surprise. Rogan has said that “I Am the Walrus” and “A Day In the Life” were scratched from the docket for being too complex, but the group plans on covering a nice sampling ranging from early Lennon to later solo work.

The event, called “Elysian Fields Forever,” begins at 9 p.m. and costs $12. It falls on what would have been the rocker’s 74th birthday.

So, which Beatle will get the Davis Rogan tribute treatment next?

“I can only imagine now that we’re going to be talking about George too by the time we finish this one,” Rogan said. “We’ll have to see.”