Back Home Again

We have arrived back home on Sept 20th, with lots of good memories, beneficial impressions, fruitful experiences and a vast amount of new knowledge regarding the spoken word world in the US.

Greatest thanks and praises to Bob Holman, Marc Smith and every single poet, slammer, organizer and other arts affiliates who contributed to the success and development of our Slam Culture expedition! 

to be definitely continued..

Conclusive Talk w/ Bob Holman

September 18, 2011

To round up our exploration of performance poetry and related genres, we sat down again with our primary host Bob Holman, who had been assisting us all throughout and in this last interview once again added a great deal to our knowledge and understanding of the evolution of the spoken word and performance poetry scene in the United States.

We talked about Bob's first encounter with poetry, the beginnings of slam poetry, the Nuyorican, the Bowery, about the digital age, about slam and hip-hop, about slam and music, about his visit to Hungary and more..

VIDEO interview - Pt.1. Intro

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VIDEO interview - Pt.2.  Bob's Story

VIDEO interview - Pt.3. Bob on Chicago

VIDEO interview - Pt. 4. Slam & HipHop & Music & Hungary:

The entire residence of Bob Holman, including his floor is brimming with poetry:

Photos by Tamás Zádor /Kiégő Izzók and BlyWorx

Small Talk w/ Anti-Pop Consortium

September 14th, 2011

Toward the end of our research trip we shortly met two members of the undergound hip-hop crew Anti-Pop Consortium, High Priest and Earl Blaize who had met their fellow rapper mate Beans at a poetry slam event those times in the 1990's when the hip-hop and poetry communities started to come together in NYC. We talked about the relationship between the two scenes and how street poetry and rap are able to connect.

VIDEO interview coming soon!

Chicago and Marc K. Smith - Origin of Poetry Slam

September 11th, 2011

Our research was luckily extended by a trip to Chicago where it all started..

"Who inspired this madness? And why?"

Extracts from the book "Stage A Poetry Slam" by Marc Kelly Smith with Joe Kraynak:

"Performance  poetry as we know it today was the brainchild of yours truly - Marc Kelly Smith (So What!), ringmaster of the blue-collar intellectuals and eccentrics who crammed into Chicago's Get Me High Jazz Club on Monday nights from November 1984 to September 1986 for a wide-open poetry experiment that spawned the Chicago Poetry Ensemble and evolved into the international poetry slam movement.

Chicago Poetry Ensemble

The success of Monday nights at the Get me High led to the creation of a poetry vaudevillian cabaret show called the Uptown Poetry Slam. The show debuted on July 20, 1986 at the Green Mill Jazz Club on Chicago's North Side and featured performances by the Chicago Poetry Ensemble and other local poets with flair for the dramatic. it's where the term "poetry slam" was first coined and stamped on the face of performance poetry and later competitive poetry."

We were fortunate to meet the founder himself - Marc Kelly Smith or as he is also called the SlamPapi, and managed to have a nice long interview with him about the starting years, the developments and the present days of poetry slam, and we must say that despite his distinct popularity and achievements he was the most humble, generous and kind-hearted man we met in Chicago. Big respect and greatest honor to the man who invented slam poetry!

Photos by BlyWorx

Uptown Poetry Slam @ Green Mill, Chicago

September 11th, 2011

Last part of the video series of Marc Smith's interview - The Message of SlamPapi:

Marc Talks about the slam show in general, its structure, the rules, the forms and more:

Marc talks about his slam experiences in Europe:

The rest of the interview and show extracts is coming soon!

Some additional good-to-know info:

from the Green Mill website:
In 1986 Marc Kelly Smith approached Dave Jemilo, the owner of the Green Mill (a Chicago jazz club and former haunt of Al Capone), with a plan to host a weekly poetry cabaret on the club's slow Sunday nights. Jemilo welcomed him, and on July 25, the Uptown Poetry Slam was born. Smith drew on baseball and bridge terminology for the name, and instituted the show’s basic structure of an open mike, guest performers, and a competition. The Green Mill evolved into the Mecca for performance poets, and the Uptown Poetry Slam still continues 25 years after its inception.

The event always starts with an open mic, then comes a guest appearance and finally the slam competition, and it has been like that for the past 25 years, with Marc Kelly Smith himself as the all-time host!

To our greatest surprise and joy, in Chicago it is not only allowed to use a band for background music, but it is actually encouraged by Marc at the slam events. It is not compulsory, nor prohibited, the slammer is free to choose whether he/she wants improvized music accompanying the performance or not. (A custom often applied in Hungary as well.)
The three musicians:

Moments from the Open Mic:

watch how Marc and the drummer change places!

Special appearance by Kevin Coval:

Guest appearance - Speak'Easy Ensemble (coached by Marc Smith):

Molly Meacham and Shelley Elaine G. Randall

J.W. Basilo and Dan Sullivan

 Moments from the Slam:

Marc counting the points:

 ... and conjuring the award (that is 11 US dollars):

 ...and in the end congratulating the winner of the night:

VIDEO extracts coming soon!
Photos by BlyWorx

The Nuyorican Slam

September 9th, 2011

By all means, we could not have missed the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, where the first poetry slam ever in New York City was held in 1989, and 22 years later it has become part of the cultural history of NYC, still going strong. Today's Nuyorican Poetry Slam is the result of their tradition of talented hosts, amazing performers and heart-stopping performances. Each one has helped to develop the legendary Poetry Slam reputation that is associated with the Cafe around the world. If you want to learn who these people have been, the years they participated, their contact info & lots more, please see Verbs on Asphalt, the authorized multimedia website that documents the whole story of Slam at the Nuyorican from the beginning.

The Friday night slam is known to be a sensational show every single week. It starts at 10pm, we went there at 9pm and the line in front of the entrance was long already, and within an hour just got longer and longer.

Before the event we managed to catch Mahogany Browne, the host and curator of the Friday Night Nuyorican slams for a brief talk in front of the Cafe.  
Video interview coming soon!

This time the evening was dedicated to the homecoming for the Nuyorican National Slam Team who came in 2nd at the Championship, so Big Congratulations!  - Carvens Lissaint, Soulfull Jones, Tre G, Witness, Brian Omni Dillon and Mahogany Browne (Coach).

The Opening act was an impressive music/poetry duet by The Robin and the Lady Poet (Robin Andre and Erica Miriam Fabri):

The policy at the Nuyorican does not allow film recording, so we will not be able to show video extracts.
Instead here is some info about Slamming at the Nuyorican, taken from the website:

"Poetry Slam @the Nuyorican is truly poetry of and by the people. Winners of any Nuyorican Poetry Slam are chosen entirely by our varied audience members; a continual stream of changing faces, ages and backgrounds that make up New York City on any given night. Audience judges are not required to have any special skills or history and that's what always makes our slam so exciting and unpredictable.

Many Poetry Slammers have begun their careers in either the Wednesday Night Slam Open or the Open Room. Some will come back and compete many times before winning a slam, so keep on coming! 2008 National Team member, Rico Steal, began his career at the Nuyorican in the Open Room and didn't quit until he was slamming on Friday Nights!

Winner of Wednesday Night Slam Open is eligible to compete in a Friday Night Slam. If you win a Friday Night Slam, you are eligible to compete in one of the five Semi-Final Poetry Slams that happen throughout our Slam season.
If you win a Semi-Final slam, you will become one of five poets to compete in our yearly Grand Slam Finale, which generally happens in April. The winner of that slam takes the Grand Slam Champion title for that year and immediately qualifies to be on our National Team. The rest of our yearly National Team comes out of three Run-Off Slams, which happen after the Grand Slam Finale. We send these team members to compete yearly in the National Poetry Slam. 

Spotlight Poets are featured before the Slam each Friday Night and are curated by the Nuyorican SlamMaster.

Although we could not record the event, among the Nuyorican's Facebook posts we found this link, where you can check out the most notable moments.

Photos: BlyWorx