20-09-2013 15_02_31

  In the car: Planet Rock

On the page: Be[yond] by Sarah James

Where I'm at: Spoken Worlds tonight

In the ether: litter magazine (Leafe press)

This week I was at two Leicester events. 

Shindig!, organised by Crystal Clear Creators and Nine Arches Press, at the Western is an established and well organised event. It has four invited guest readers, a good PA, and up to twenty open mic readers. There is a big, gentle, appreciative audience with a wide age range which has a large number of members aged 35+

The quality of the words tends to be high, risks taken, few.

Open mic sets are short, one poem only and there can be a lot of noise from the bar which can affect audibility of poets at the back of the room.

Find The Right Words also has guests and an excellent PA. Ably run and hosted by Jess Green, it advertises itself as for rap and performance poetry. 

The average age is about twenty years younger than Shindig!, and risk taking is positively encouraged. Reflecting this, the stories of he performers are strong and more personal, the performance slots are longer, performers more intense, and "performance" is very much to the fore.

The quality of several performances was outstanding, particularly the rappers, the event itself is hugely entertaining and if your style tends towards performance or rap this is the stage for you. If you enjoy a good performance, and who doesn't?, then it is also well worth a visit for its fresh and positive atmosphere.

Spoken Worlds is on tonight. This is the even I run, the PA is smaller, the audience and participants somewhere towards the age of Shindig!, but we are less formal than either of the others and not limited to poetry ( to be fair, both are tolerant of storytelling and a little prose).

Communication Frustration

In the car: planet rock

On the page: black and white and read all over by Tony Keeton

Where I'm at: Leicester Shindig and Find The Right Words

Onscreen: Spider-Man 3

In recent weeks I have been to events designated as writers' networking events, a festival of writing and several readings/ open mic events.

The issues at the networking events tended to revolve around selling and money in one form or another.

The networking aimed at individual writers had questions around the themes of getting published, deciding print runs, marketing of published work, falling poetry sales and so on.

The poetry organisers' networking looked at how much poets should be paid as performers, how to build audiences, how to bring money into the poetry world.

 It strikes me that the biggest problems don't lie in what kinds of events we have, or how they are funded, but in sheer communication problems, some of which relate to the way that the arts are funded and how the funding is used.

Funding tends to be by county or, more recently, region. Funding is used for specific projects, for a set period of time. 

So we have Writing East Midlands and Writing West Midlands, both tend to have many city based events on the assumption that the centres of population are also the centres of interest. Is there any joining up of the Midlands? From a funding and organisational point of view, it seems there is very little. For people, yes. I see a big overlap in the faces at events in both areas. 

Organisers should talk more to each other across these artificial borders, not just within them. We all know poets suitable for each others' events, lets start networking properly, lets really use this Internet as a tool, not jus for publicity.

Theatre of Sound

In the car: Resin

On the page: the Anansi Boys, Neil Gaiman ( thanks for the loan, Margaret)

Where I'm at: All sorts of events

Onscreen: New series of Vera

In the ether: http://Www.birminghamliteraturefestival.org

 At the weekend I performed at two very different events.

The first of these was at the Stafford Arts Festival, in the Gatehouse Theatre. 

The theatre was the venue for all of the poetry. 

The second event was in the gallery at Jasmine Cottage, on the outskirts of Derby, which was hosted by Richard Heley and Seema Gill.

Each event had its attractions.

In Stafford there were around twenty five poets, all sitting on the stage at the same time. The atmosphere was very supportive, but there was no real opportunity to stand around and chat. The candidates for Young Laureate also had little opportunity to speak to the local "scene" poets, which is a shame, because young poets have less idea of what is out there, and can often feel quite isolated.

It was, however, a great chance to see several poets perform that I had previously managed to miss. Standout performances were by Phil Binding, Surjit Dharmi and Tony Keeton, Tom Wyre also made an impression, having found ways to breathe new life into several pieces. Jack Edwards managed to bring the whole event together wonderfully.

In Derby the atmosphere was much more intimate and relaxed. A group of ten poets and musicians read, played and improvised, often finding themes in the work of the other participants. Richard MC'd on the night, Seema produced figs from the garden and another of her wonderful crumbles for the fairly extended break for chat and food. Both were on good poetic form. Chris White improvised percussion using one small drum and several found objects, including a spanner. Dennis Derby, Stevie Lonestar and Richard all played guitar and read poetry. Phil Binding, Jayne Stanton and Tom Wyre had all made the trip from Stafford, with work that sounded very different in these surroundings.

        

Which of these has the best future for poetry?

I'll consider that in my next post.