June Slam Roundup
Read or join the discussion on this post.
In a more intimate venue than May’s El Mocambo rock n’ roll palace, June’s Toronto Poetry Slam at Cervejaria brought the fire with explosive words and memorable performances. Spencer waxed poetic about Full House, Krystle introduced us to “10-cow wives” and Craig broke his slam virginity with a rockin’ piece about football (I mean, soccer. No, I mean football).
Congrats to the poets who made the second round and are thus able to qualify for the Toronto slam team: Krystle, Truth Is, Awd, Craig, Spencer, Ziy and Leviathan. Not a weak performance among them. But when the dust settled after the third round, Leviathan won by a mere .1 over Krystle, taking home the scratch and an impressive score.
The qualifiers will climax with July’s early-evening slam at the Drake Hotel, but note that slam sign-up priority will be given to those who made the second rounds in May and June. They are: Spencer, Leviathan, Krystle, Truth Is, Awd, Craig, Ziy, Gypsy Eyes, Nigel, Charles, Matthew Glick and Amanda. Who will make the team? Come to the July slam to find out!
June 27th, 2006 at 11:07 pm
GO SPENCER GO SPENCER GO SPENCER GO
June 29th, 2006 at 9:40 am
Just a curiosity here on my part:
I notice the format of the Toronto Poetry Slam involves random judging, and this random judging is basically giving the foundation for who can potentially qualify to represent Toronto in Milwaukee. I am wondering if the judges at the Milwaukee slam will be random judges as well? I guess this is of concern to me, not out of bitterness for not getting a shot to be on the team, but thinking that some other poets (ahem…Spencer) should have scored higher than others.
I know that Dave has explained why a high and a low score get eliminated because there is the possibility that the poet has a friend or an enemy that could sway favour either side. I am just wondering why the random judging? Would there ever be a chance of a say “celebrity judges” like say having known names like Robert Priest, Phlip Arima,and Allan Briesmaster sit in as judges? I mean those names were just examples, it’s just that even though poetry is extremely personal, and interpretive, would it not be to the benefit of the Toronto team to have judges that are actually familiar with concepts of poetry from a performance and a writing end, rather than random people who have never been to a slam, or rarely go to slams, or are not familiar with poetry, and the presentation there of?
Would it weaken the team’s chances, or would it not matter?
July 4th, 2006 at 10:57 pm
so THAT’S how the scoring works….frig.
July 4th, 2006 at 11:52 pm
Val, just to clarify: the qualifiers are finding a team for the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word, not the Milwaukee slam (which already occurred, and Toronto was repped by Gypsy, Tomy B., Soul, and DaneJahRas). The CFSW is going down in Toronto from OCt 11 to 14, with teams from all over Canada competing.
So why random judging? It goes back to the concept of slam: by the people, for the people. It’s all about democratization of verse, allowing anyone to take the stage and allowing anyone to judge who should move on or ship out. Basically, I think celeb judging is a decent idea but not necessary. And I truly think that if published poets, like the ones you mentioned, were judges, we’d be seeing MANY low scores for everyone, since those kind of judges are hard to please. But maybe that’s what you want, and maybe that might good for slam.
But I’m stickin by random judging cuz it’s worked for 20 years in the slam scene in North America, and I really dig how passionate some people get about judging. Makes the night real interactive, real heart-warming.
See ya on July 22, if not sooner
July 5th, 2006 at 12:32 am
Hmm… good question…
But I wonder, isn’t celebrity judging just as arbitrary? Robert and Phlip are both great poets in my opinion (don’t know Allan’s stuff, sorry), but that’s just it - it is simply my opinion. Whose to say how to best choose a roster of judges? It may end up even more unfairly slanted that way; and the cool thing about slam is that it really is poetry for the people. You don’t have to have studied anything, you just have to know what you like and what makes you think.
Yeah, I think being able to move at least two different random selections of people - some who will be “familiar” with poetry and some who won’t - is a truer test of your words.
July 5th, 2006 at 12:37 am
Hi folks. Just wanted to apologize for comments not appearing immediately. Some were held for moderation for an unknown reason. They should all be up now.
July 5th, 2006 at 1:24 am
Thanks for answering my question guys, and thank you for the clarification Dave. I was not aware that random judging at a slam was traditional, and tradition is something I completely respect. The “by the people, for the people” philosophy works, on two fronts, sometimes for the quality of a poem, balanced with the quality of it’s delivery, and sometimes, which is where I shake my head, because a particular poet gets a really loud cheer,not necessarily because of the poem, and so the judges feel inclined to give a high score because of the loud cheer. I completely understand your stance, and hey man this is just one loudmouth moron Italian talking here, I am not trying to legislate anything. Smitty said “You don’t have to have studied anything, you just have to know what you like, and what makes you think. I completely agree, which is actually a credo that got me inquiring about the whole judging process. Those names I mentioned, are not the cup of tea of many slam poets, however, are not averse to slam poetry. I notice a great deal of exclusivity when it becomes vice versa, and I can understand why, different atmosphere, and more enjoyable by a long shot. When it came to poetry, the most amount of studying I did was reading all of Charles Bukowski’s books, and then going to a bar and trying to be like him, no University required. It was my way of informing myself, still, even though I have only been to two slams, a “dream team” of slam poets that I would like to see compete floats around in my head all the time, and I guess myself, and others can’t all have it our way though eh? Sorry to ruffle any feathers, but I am sure you have them all numbered just in case.