www.traversepoetry.org

Congratulations to the winners of the ACT heat of the Australian Poetry Slam 2009!

1. Adam Hadley
2. Will Small
3. CJ Huet

As in previous years, the range was quite a bit different from the monthly gigs at The Front, with a much stronger focus on hip hop. We also had some much younger poets (including one 11-year-old rapping about illegal street racing… hmm…) and a few more ‘random’ (for want of a better word) performers, in particular a guy reading some gorgeous haiku off an iPhone.

There were too few women performing again. I’m hoping next year’s slams (and perhaps another all-women night sometime in the year) will encourage some more ladies to get behind the mic – there’s so much talent in our town!

Last year’s overall winner, Omar Musa, also did a smashing performance of the piece he did with Hadley, Seung, Fenella and I at Corinbank earlier this year.

So, this month we have a more low-key event, not really a slam at all (let’s call it a ‘sham slam’ shall we?) and more of an open mic:

Traverse Poetry Night
Friday 27 November
7.30pm-10.30pm
The Front Gallery and Cafe
Wattle Street, Lyneham
Free entry for everyone!

And, before I go, I need to plug the launch of issue 9 of Block journal, this week at Smiths:

Block 9 launch
Thursday 19 November
6.00pm-7.00pm
Smiths Alternative Bookshop
76 Aligna Street, Canberra City

I’ve just updated the events page with details of the ACT heat of the Australian Poetry Slam. This is the big one: $600 in prizes, plus your chance to win a shot at the national prize of $5000 and a gig at the 2010 Ubud Writers & Readers Festival in Bali!

Australian Poetry Slam ‘09 – ACT heat
6 November 6:00-10:00pm
Foyer National Library of Australia
Parkes Place

As in previous years you’ll need to book a slot by calling the library on (02) 6262 1271.

For the benefit of those who haven’t attended an Australian Poetry Slam before, the rules are slightly different to the slams at The Front. The time limit is 2 minutes, not 3. Also, there will be five audience members judging you out of 10 with the highest and lowest scores disregarded. If there’s a draw (as there has been on the previous two occasions) we’ll get you to perform a second piece – so make sure you prepare for this possibility!

Meanwhile, you’ll be able to practice your pieces at the Halloween Slam next week:

Halloween Slam
30 October 7:30-11:30pm
The Front Gallery and Café
Wattle St, Lyneham

We’ll be doing some special fun things for this slam, including awarding a prize for the scariest poem of the night!

It’s possible that this month’s slam may be the last one at The Front for the year, given that the ACT heat is next month and December’s slam will take place at the National Museum of Australia (more on that later).

I’ll be gauging people’s interest in a November Front slam next Friday so speak up if you want it to happen! Note that if it does go ahead it will probably be quite a low-key event.

My word, what an action-packed final it was!

At the end of an incredibly tense slam, Omar Musa (last year’s ACT winner, and grand final runner up) and David Finnigan (whose extreme creativity constantly blows me away) drew for first place and then, after each poet performed a second piece, drew for a second time. So there will be three poets – Hadley, Omar and David – going up to Sydney for the grand final!

Omar’s style was very emotional and down to earth, and less hip hop than last year – his delivery is extremely smooth and a delight to hear. Both of Dave’s pieces were, as too be expected, utterly unexpected. The first, a conversation between David (who writes poetry) and David (who gets the credit) and the second, a passionate yet scientific description of how planets and moons are formed.

As I predicted we had a packed final night and a third of the 20 performers were people I’d never seen perform at previous slams. I tried to get around and talk to all of these poets after the competition and most people seemed interested in coming along to slams at The Front. Unfortunately the regular ones won’t start again until late January, so I hope they will stay keen over the new year’s break.

Munro, Jules (Casual Projects) and Ben were a perfect accompaniment to the slam… Heidi commented on how much they reminded her of early Whitlams – and Munro is certainly as enternaining performer as Tim. Such a pity we will be loosing them to Melbourne!

The Australian Poetry Slams are always a very different sort of poetry slam to our usual ones at The Front.

I think running two heats has positives and negatives. The positives are twice the chance for people to get up and give slam a shot and double the exposure for Canberra slamming in general. The main negative is spreading the possible number of performances too thinly. Last year the single heat was packed with an incredible amount of energy for such a huge room (the National Library foyer). Friday’s slam was quieter but still a rocking good night. I have a suspicion that next week we’ll get a few people over the 20 we’re permitted.

We were under this time and it was slightly disappointing that five of those who had registered didn’t show up to perform (where were you Tom?!?), but the suggestion of the nice Sound Advice guy of walking around with the wireless mic and persuading people to perform was a good one, and one which got us an enjoyable performance from a bloke named Nemo (no aquatic jokes please).

Human Cannonball Academy (AKA Adam Hadley) took the gold with a delightful comparison between dropping the bombshell of ‘I love you’ and dropping the bombshell of having sold all the paracutes as the plane plummets towards to ground.

The silver medal went to a new slam performer, Susan Carcary (winner of the 2008 NSW Bush Poetry Championships) with a hartfeld cry from a little orphan African boy to be saved from the greedy hands of from Brad and Jolie.

Seung was awesome as always, as was Professor Anarchy who has promised to perform another piece for us next Friday.

The crowd seemed to like my love poem which was heartening since I’d only written it three days before. Will put pen to paper to get another one down for next week.

The Cashews were a delight as always, making great use of the space, although not getting all the attention from the crowd that I think they deserved.

Roughly half of Friday’s performances were from people I’ve never seen before which is also what happened last year – I need to figure out a way I can get this talent to perform as part of the regular slams!

Tomorrow (Friday 7 November) night, on ABC Stateline* (7.30pm).

Of course, all of you will be at the slam at that time so you’ll have to set your VCR or catch the repeat Saturday at noon.

The recording happened on Monday – the reporter was sick so the cameraman filmed Heidi answering questions about the slam then Seung Baek, Dennis Wild (runner up of last year’s ACT heat) and I performed a piece each, twice (with the camera at different angles). We did the filming in the National Library’s bookshop against the lovely stained glass windows and I think it went rather well.

People tell me they’ve seen me on the Stateline promo so I presume I’ll make the final cut for the actual show.

*Whose website is gagging for a re-design.