Poets Compete for Performance Prize
Assembling from the cities of Albuquerque, Denver, Chicago, San Francisco, etcetera, 78 poets compete in the Individual World Poetry Slam (iWPS) Wed 10/12 through Sat 10/15.
Audience members can directly affect, and be deeply affected by, the bouts and finals at Cleveland State University as well as night events at Xecutive UltraLounge, The Clevelander and Harry Buffalo.
Today’s slam poets carry on the legacy of Marc Smith, a construction worker who initiated the slam movement in the mid-eighties.
One Truth, a full-time artist and five-year iWPS volunteer, says, “He really wanted to take poetry out of the beatnik era and bring it to common people, so he started to perform poetry in bars, and he came up with a system. He would pull five random judges out of the audience. You don’t have to have a degree in Education or English—if that happens to happen, then that’s the beauty of slam. Five random judges, picked out of the audience, on a point system from 0 to 10, with one decimal point, and that poet’s job is to translate to five random people that they’ll never meet again in their life.”
In this embrace of chance and subjectivity, slam poets attune themselves to the moment-by-moment reactions of the audience in order to raise the level of their performance.
“You have to read the crowd,” One Truth says. “All of the poets get a chance to look over the judges, and they can build their strategy from there. A lot of strategy comes after you hear what is doing well. You’ll have a lot of poets who are like, ‘Oh, OK, that funny piece did well, I’m gonna ride that funny piece, and see if I can come with something funny also,’ or ‘It’s been four or five funny pieces in a row, let me deaden the room a little bit and break it back down to some serious work.’ All of those can be right or wrong strategies, and it’s really up to the poet to see when is the right time to make a move. Sometimes you change your poem at the microphone.” In the end, however, the iWPS honors the power of poetry rather than the pursuit of a prize.
“We have a thing that you’ll hear at all the festivals/poetry competitions: ‘The point is the poetry, not the points,’” One Truth says. “You’ll get a spoken word artist getting up there, coming from the heart.”
The iWPS kick-off event, the Last Chance Slam, hosted by Xecutive UltraLounge on Prospect Avenue on Wed 10/12 at 8pm, offers any performer who missed registration the opportunity to enter the iWPS free of charge.
“The winner gets a free ride into the competition and fills the last slot,” One Truth says. “And that has become very popular, because a lot of the quote-unquote heavy hitters have started to say, real boldly, ‘I’ll just come to the city just to be in the Last Chance.’ To give you an example, the guy that won the Last Chance Slam last year won the whole competition.”
Day events and preliminary bouts (check http://IWPS.poetryslam.com for the full schedule) are held in Cleveland State University’s Main Classroom Building. Preliminary bouts are held three at a time during two segments, the first at 7pm and the second at 9pm.
On Thursday and Friday, The Clevelander on Huron Road East hosts specialty Open Mics outside the scope of the competition: an Erotic Reading on Thursday and the Decathlon Slam on Friday.
“That is one of the hardest events to explain,” One Truth says. “You have to see the Decathlon Slam to understand it, and it’s just a lot of fun. It’s like a pick-up game. It’s ten rounds—you can have a team of three, you can have a team of five, up to ten people, and each round has a theme that the team has to go with. People just really have a good time.”
Other Open Mics are held throughout the week, including an LGBT Open Mic on Friday and a Hip Hop Open Mic on Saturday. The final bouts are held in CSU’s Waetjen Auditorium, after which Harry Buffalo on East 4th hosts the after party.
As a competitor in and volunteer with Poetry Slam, Incorporated, One Truth followed National Poetry Slams around the country. He never thought to organize a competition back in Cleveland until the suggestion was made to him.
“One time somebody just asked me, ‘Hey, you know, what’s up with Cleveland?’” One Truth recalls. “I was like, ‘Nah, I don’t think we could ever do that.’ And then I found the area, and I just said, ‘You know what, I’m gonna bring all the stuff that I’ve seen to Cleveland, and all the friends that I’ve made, I’m just gonna bring them to Cleveland to meet all my other friends. A lot of people have never been to this city. I know a couple people are like, ‘Yeah, I’m very, very excited to come to Cleveland, I’ve never been to Cleveland before, I wanna go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. You know, you guys were always cool, so I can’t wait to come to your city.’”
The Individual World Poetry Slam (iWPS) runs Wed 10/12 through Sat 10/15. Day events cost $3 for admittance. Night events are $5. The final bouts cost $25 to attend. For more information, including events, times and tickets, visit http://IWPS.poetryslam.com.
Isaac Mell grew up in South Euclid, OH and attended American Jewish University in Los Angeles. He welcomes conversations with potential employers, collaborators and friends.
One Response to “Slam Chance: Poets Compete for Performance Prize”
Stephanie Lipscomb
Thank you Isaac for this awesome article/blog!!