Billy Porter to Bring Evening of Songs and Stories to Bay Street Theater

Bay Street Theater & Sag Harbor Center for the Arts have announced the cabaret series Music Mondays continues on Monday, August 14 at 8 pm with Billy Porter (Tony Award winner for Kinky Boots).

Tickets range from $69 to $145 and are available online at www.baystreet.org or by calling the Bay Street Theater Box Office at 631-725-9500, open seven days a week 11 am to an hour before showtime for purchases. Music Mondays is sponsored in part by Grenning Gallery.

In this intimate concert, Tony and Grammy winner Billy Porter presents an evening of songs and stories from his experiences on the Great White Way. Along with James Sampliner, his long-time music director and collaborator, Billy has translated some of the most iconic Broadway music of the past eight decades into African American idioms, including soul, gospel, hip-hop, funk and R&B in Concert and on his newly released CD. Billy's Back on Broadway, Porter's highly debut on Concord Records and latest CD, features ten classics made famous on the Great White Way that focus on inspiration, empowerment and hope, the album's title is a nod to Sammy Davis, Jr.'s recording Sammy's Back on Broadway. It's a musical evening that will have you dancing in your seat!

Billy Porter is a Tony- and Grammy Award-winning singer, composer, actor, playwright, and director. He won the 2013 Tony Award for Lead Actor in a Musical for his performance in Kinky Boots. Other Broadway credits include Miss Saigon, Five Guys Named Moe, Grease, Smokey Joe's Café, and Dreamgirls. Porter's off-Broadway and regional credits include Angels in America, Romance in HardTimes, The Merchant of Venice, House of Lear, Radiant Baby, Birdie Blue, Going Native, Jelly's Last Jam, Topdog/Underdog, Songs for a New World, Jesus Christ Superstar, A Chorus Line and Chicago. His solo show, Ghetto Superstar: The Man That I Am, debuted at The Public Theater in 2005. In 2014, his play While I Yet Live, starring S. Epatha Merkerson, premiered at Primary Stages in New York. Directing credits include The Wiz; Signed, Sealed, Delivered: The Music of Stevie Wonder; Five Guys Named Moe; Altar Boyz; Rent; Being Alive, a musical celebration mixing the canons of Sondheim and Shakespeare with musical styles of the African-American experience; and Sam Harris' HAM, A Musical Memoir. He won an NAACP Theatre Award for his direction of Once on This Island at Reprise in Los Angeles, where he also conceived and directed a musical revue entitled The Soul of Rodgers. Last spring he directed George C. Wolfe's The Colored Museum at Boston's Huntington Theatre. He most recently appeared on Broadway under the direction of Mr.Wolfe in Shuffle Along.

Remaining artists in the Music Mondays series include Tony and Grammy Award winner Jennifer Holliday on August 21 and Academy Award winner Stephen Schwarz and Friends (including Emmy Award winner Liz Callaway, Tony Award winner Debbie Gravitte and Scott Coulter) on August 28.

Bay Street Theater & Sag Harbor Center for the Arts is a year-round, not-for-profit professional theater and community cultural center which endeavors to innovate, educate, and entertain a diverse community through the practice of the performing arts. We serve as a social and cultural gathering place, an educational resource, and a home for a community of artists.