A history of poetry performance in the UK

40 years of British poetry under a virtual roof.

"This sample of British poetry readings...reveals a diverse range of voicing styles, which make distinct use of cadence, intonation and pace - acoustic devices which can develop or even transform the semantics of a poem."

Highlights in this archive hosted by the University of Southampton include:

• Hugh MacDiarmid
• Jackie Kay (go and see her live too)
• Attila the Stockbroker
• Patience Agbabi

You can find out more here: http://poetry.eprints.org/

Arizona Poetry Center

Rich pickings awaiting you here and you can while away the start of a long weekend or a slow Friday at work picking through the alphabetised archive.

 "voca, the University of Arizona Poetry Center's Audio Video Library, features recordings from the Center's long-running Reading Series and other readings presented under the auspices of the Center."

Nice...

You can find the main archive here http://voca.arizona.edu/ and you might check out Lawrence Ferlinghetti (including a marvellously ponderous schedule by A.N.Other) here http://voca.arizona.edu/index.php?reading_id=142.

Poetry in the barn 18th May 2012 Huntingdon, USA

Huntington Historical Society Barn, corner of High Street and New York Avenue in Huntington Village.

I fancy going to the historical barn a lot - in fact I would probably go with or without poetry reading. But barn and poetry is a win win situation. (And what's this Huntingdon was named the Budget Travel magazine's 5th Coolest Small Town in the United States in 2009.)

This event is tomorrow! 8pm EDT

Featuring Maria Manobianco, Paula Camacho and Helen R Peterson. Open mic, $5.


Photo by Lars Lentz

Poet and geek Ruth Aylett

Ruth Aylett is a poet and Professor of Computer Sciences in the School of Maths and Computer Science at Heriot-Watt University in Scotland. She researches intelligent graphical characters, affective agent models, human-robot interaction, and interactive narrative. She was a founder of the International Conference Intelligent Virtual Agents. She has more than 200 publications - book chapters, journals, and refereed conferences.

You can hear her work here http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/~ruth/writing/Medusa.mp3 and learn more about Ruth here http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/~ruth/bio.html.



To feature on poetandgeek.com, check out http://poetandgeek.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/poetandgeek-oral-poetry-project.html

poetandgeek oral poetry project

1. Record yourself reading your poem.
2. Put it on YouTube or the site of your choice.
3. Send us the link.
4. We like it - we post it.

3D chant

Imagine painting poetry? And no, I don't mean a line from a poem on your back or shoulder in the form of a tattoo. Or the name of your mother.

But a picture that records history and self that works in the context of a poem; the pictorial equivalent of the troubadour's lyre. Or a mediaeval map.

Not that unthinkable. In oral culture, cave painting to sand patterns kicked up with the feet in dance serve as a metre for the words sung or chanted.

Aboriginal people did not record their lives through writing, instead they sung their land in ceremonial events comprising singing, storytelling, and dance. Telling of ancestors, topography of the country, its landmarks, laws and customs.

Don't forget as you walk down the street and turn the corner on your way to work. 

What words come into your head each time you shimmy round the postbox and over the lip of the zebra crossing, examine the changing tree, chimney, window lights and people?

Is that memory chant brought to life?

Cognitive maps

Cognitive maps are a way of remembering things that poets often find useful.In fact, it could be argued that the very act of being a poet is in some way underpinned by the ability to cognitively map. Poets (as Wordsworth pointed out) use the inner eye to build  and add spatial knowledge, in order to visualize images and reduce cognitive load. This  method adds to our ability to recall and learn information.

The oldest known formal method of using spatial locations to remember data is the "method of loci". Used once by Roman rhetoric students (using a Greek system) when memorizing speeches. You will have heard of this one - in some ways it is like a platform game. You memorize the appearance of a physical location (for example, the sequence of rooms in a building). When a list of words, for example, needs to be memorized, You just put an object representing that word in one of imagined locations. To recall the list, the learner mentally walks through the rooms, noticing the objects placed there in virtual imagination.

Poets can help themselves by learning this method because it enables them to write on the move in their head; and many other tasks beside. Not least declamation - something I have never been able to get my head round.

Auction chant as poetic form

Does auction chant qualify as a form of poetry?

I think the clue is in the word chant. Derived from the French word to sing, chants form the basis of the most elemental expressions; ranging from playground and football chants, hardcore punk to battle cries and liturgy.  Auctioneer chant, like poetry, has formal rules and uses rhythm and repetition among other techniques to command attention; it is a kind of performance technique.

At its simplest, auctioneers speak using a rhythmic repetition of numbers and "filler words" - usually active verbs make, go, bid - spoken by an auctioneer as the auction progresses.  "One pound, one pound I have, make two pounds, two pounds". Of course, the talk will be the sweeter and slower where there are more valuable things to sell: we have all seen or read about the drama of an expensive vase or painting going under the hammer. The chant itself is a learned skill and you can go to auctioneer school; for example, the modestly titled World Champion College of Auctioneering in Bakersfield, California (http://www.championbidcalling.com/who.htm) or train in one week at the http://www.auctioneerschool.com/ in Mankato, Minnesota (which has the endearing claim that their "students are of all ages, men and women, from all states, Canada and the world"). There are competitions for the best calling such as the National Auctioneers Association in the US and far from being unintelligible, clarity of chant is one of the criteria used for judging.  The fastest calling, and therefore the most difficult for outsiders to understand, is to be found at car auctions (125 to 175 cars per hour), commodity and livestock markets; the average household auction sells 60 items per hour on average.

"Rhythm is as important as speed in developing an effective chant. Auctioneers will adjust their speed, depending on the bidding experience level of their crowd, and the numbers of a good chant will be readily understood," says Joseph Keefhaver lately of the National Auctioneers Association. Sounds almost like a poet working a room at a gig to me.

Of course, auctioneers aim for a sound that is their own and they will be able to maintain it uniformly throughout a whole auction but perhaps that is not so dissimilar to a ballad specialist or the recitation style of the Compline.

Poets recording online can learn something from the intense chant preparation of auctioneers. Is there a performance school just for poets? I'd like to hear from you; especially if you are not just the slam end of performance.

I remember a great chant poem performed at Larry's Bar, Columbus, Ohio by Charles Ciccarello when the repeated words White Jeep, howled and tugged at the very walls of the room...

Spoken word radio seeks submissions: Radio Wildfire

Another opportunity to get your voice heard online, the UK's Radio Wildfire, a small independent radio station bringing you an eclectic mix of original spoken word, literature, discussion, and writing is on the look out for work from new and up-and-coming poets.


Submission guidelines can be found here...http://www.radiowildfire.com/submit/


The next live transmission on Radio Wildfire is on Monday 7th March 20.00 - 22.00 UK time but check out the streaming loop broadcast to get a feel.