Words by Benjamin Solah
Saturday night was the relaunch of monthly left-wing spoken word night, Keep Left, after ending last year. Taking it over from Paulie, I moved it to the left-wing arts space, Under the Hammer and after a lead-up of a few months. With the help of leftie poets Amanda Anastasi and Santo Cazzati, I relaunched it on the weekend with success, but of course, I might be biased.
(more…)
Posted by Benjamin Solah on June 24, 2013
http://melbournespokenword.com/2013/06/24/the-relaunch-of-keep-left/
Words by Benjamin Solah
On Saturday night, teaming up with Conduit Arts Initiative, Melbourne Spoken Word put on our first poetry gig as an organisation and website, presenting six poets in a lovely art space on Brunswick Street to an intimate crowd. I performed alongside a bit of an ‘all-star’ lineup of Melbourne poets: Kerry Loughrey, Santo Cazzati, Randall Stephens, Amanda Anastasi and Steve Smart, who all presented unique performances, showcasing the diverse nature of the scene, and utilising the space. It was refreshing to be in a space with no microphone and people were able to use their voice in interesting ways, to pin-drop silence.
Photos by Mandy Kitchener
Conduit Arts Initiative have a very under-rated space on Brunswick Street. It is dedicated for performance and so everyone there was there to listen to poetry. And the acoustics of the room meant I could use my voice how I intend to. It was a very liberating experience as a poet to perform there. Randall Stephens also used the space very well, even stepping out onto the street at one point and broached that unconscious divide between ‘stage’ and audience.
Photos by Mandy Kitchener
This was the first time we put on an event as a website. I’ve done a few myself, but there will be more now. You don’t want to miss the next one.
Posted by Benjamin Solah on May 20, 2013
http://melbournespokenword.com/2013/05/20/melbourne-spoken-word-debuted-our-first-poetry-gig-with-conduit-arts/
House of Bricks, a new spoken word gig that started in December last year, following on from the Egg Gallery readings, has attracted an impressive crowd for its January gig last Thursday. Like Egg Gallery, House of Bricks spoken word takes place in an art gallery and has attracted a crowd outside the usual poetry crowd. MC Santo Cazzati says that numbers were around 100 as people packed in despite the bad weather to hear a range of feature poets.
HOB takes place on the last day of each month, regardless of day and is well worth getting along to.
Photo by Di Cousens
Posted by Benjamin Solah on February 5, 2013
http://melbournespokenword.com/2013/02/05/new-gig-house-of-bricks-attracts-impressive-crowd/
Story by Benjamin Solah
Photo by Di Cousens
The Brunswick Hotel was full last night for the last Passionate Tongues poetry night for the year and it was for a special reason. Melbourne poets Richard Smolarek and Amanda Anastasi used their open mic spot to surprise MC Michael Reynolds with a gift, a cheque of over $1,200 raised by donations from poets around Melbourne and beyond as well as a collection of haikus about the MC.
It was an exciting night and a long time coming. Michael is much loved by poets around Melbourne. He has done a lot for everyone, encouraging new poets to continue having a go on the open mic, and giving many of us our first features. He has run Passionate Tongues poetry for a long time, turning up each fortnight to MC the event, arranging feature poets, collecting prizes for the raffle. All of this whilst working shift-work. He has been very generous and wholly deserves the money people raised for him.
Posted by Benjamin Solah on December 18, 2012
http://melbournespokenword.com/2012/12/18/melbourne-poets-honour-michael-reynolds/
The Poetry Bomb is the New Yarn Bomb with street cred or so I’d like to think. On the 23rd of June, the Peninsula Poets Society set off on a journey to paste the walls of Frankston with their words to mark the event Poetry Bomb: Show Your Voice. Participants were instructed to come armed with home-made glue (the recipe is on our YouTube channel if you’re interested), a paint brush and printed poetry. It was freezing, the flu was caught, videos were made and many a wall was splashed with poetry. There were zines, haiku, longer pieces, political bombs, odes to lost lovers, philosophical musings, laugh out loud bombs and even some spoken word along the way.
Backed by the Frankston council and the local library, the day began by bombing the library, the walls of a motorcycle shop already lit up with awesome local street art, gallery lane and the walls leading to the Peninsula’s one and only Poetry Slam event location B’Artiste where the poets translated their bombed work onto words for the stage.
Brigitte Lewis is a Melbourne poet based on the Peninsula and an organiser of Peninsula Poets (check them out on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter). She has featured at Passionate Tongues among other venues and is the author of the erotic lesbian poetic verse novel, Rubbing Mirrors.
Posted by Benjamin Solah on July 9, 2012
http://melbournespokenword.com/2012/07/09/poetry-bombing-the-peninsula/
Melbourne Poets Union
We send out a weekly newsletter with upcoming events, news and announcements of goings on in the spoken word scene and books and CDs that have been released.
