Source: Wordfreak’s flickr set - click for more

Electric. And I’m not talking about Jon. I’m referring to the vibe in the room, to how my skin felt hosting the Toronto Poetry Slam Finals Night in front of 230 people crammed inside Hugh’s Room in west-end Toronto. As expected, the audience was hungry for powerful poetry and the eight finalists didn’t disappoint.

We were treated to off-the-page stand-up poetry from the White Noise Machine; an article stuffed inside a performance piece courtesy of Krystle Mullin; emotional drenchings from our own slice of Hollywood, Amanda Hiebert; well-timed comedic rant-poems a la Arianna; team-piece mastery courtesy of Gypsy Eyes, with some help from Tomy Bewick; one heckuva romantic poem blasted by Valentino Assenza; intense portraits of physicality from Jill Binder; and potent social justice brain-punches thanks to Truth Is.

Between the rounds of talented poetry, Hugh’s Room got its first taste of Shane Koyczan, one of the most prolific spoken word poets in Canada. Even though he featured thrice last week in Toronto, this set was filled with 3/4 new material Torontonians haven’t heard in July, and it was his final cover piece of a Taylor Mali classic that brought the house down.

When the dust settled after the final round, Toronto Poetry Slam had its top four poets and its team going to Halifax for the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word. Note that a scoring/ranking error on Saturday night resulted in me naming Truth as a team member and Amanda Hiebert as the alternate. Upon further review, it’s the reverse, and I apologize for any confusion.

• Arianna
• Krystle Mullin
• White Noise Machine
• Amanda Hiebert
• Truth Is… (alternate)

So now the fundraising efforts begin, and slam fans should look forward to a few months of the Team rockin stages and practising hard for Hali, and likely a slam-off with the Up From The Roots team (January TPS co-champ Boonaa, TPS fixture Tomy Bewick, 2006 TPS member Leviathan, and UFTR founder Dwayne Morgan), Toronto’s other CFSW team. There should be tons of opportunities to catch these all-stars on stages across the city, but if you got a hankering to go the CFSW in Halifax, we’d welcome some hometown support. It’ll be a festival to remember.

This entry was posted by Dave under Slam roundups.