A record of me reading Skyborn, which is about the silver DC-9 that flies around my house.
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More to come!
Tag: performance
…In which Tim posts live
Currently enjoying the first leg of the journey that is Takin’ It To The Streets, the annual poetry pub crawl. Dante’s now, Southpaw and Blue Velvet later. For specifics, check out the Overload Poetry website page for this gig.
The launch was amazing, The Heart Chamber were fantastic.
Tim Hamilton @ Speakers Corner
I will be appearing in Speaker’s Corner, an event that is part of the Emerging Writer’s Festival.
It will be held in the Atrium of Federation Square on 24th of May, from 11am to 4pm.
The EWF’s Speakers Corner will be the major free public event for the 2009 Emerging Writers’ festival providing an opportunity for visitors to, and residents of, the City of Melbourne a chance to hear a variety of performance writers, experience and emerging present their works in a free forum. Inspired by the political soap boxing made famous in Hyde Park – London, Speakers Corner will combine spoken word, poetry, monologues, story telling, readings and opinion pieces in an innovative presentation of this work, breaking down the normal performer/ audience divide to a more dynamic blend of street theater and audience browsing.
Five soapboxes (podiums) will be set up within the atrium at Federation Square on the first Sunday of the Emerging Writers’ festival between 11 and 4 within which time the finest of Melbourne’s wordsmiths will take turns presenting their work to the passing public, trying to capture their attention and their imagination with their presentation of ideas, creativity and thoughts through their words. The public will drift between soap boxes either being captured by the performances or moving on to check out the next of the wordsmiths plying their trade.
Over the day up to 40 different writers will get a chance to present their work over five separate soap boxes providing a rare opportunity for these writers to present to new audiences as well as largely increase numbers of audience members they have performed to both outcomes which are core to the mission of the EWF.
So come along and see me and Maxine Clark, Cha-Ya Clancy, Santo Cazzatti, Michelle Dabrowski, Dragonfly, Meg Dunn, Crazy Elf, Julez, Anthony O’Sullivan, Marc Testart perform in public!
Reading: “All Of Us: The Collected Poems of Raymond Carver“
Listening: “Lua” – Amanda Palmer (Bright Eyes cover)
Eating: Pumpkin Lasagne
Post Passionate Tongues Review
Well, that was a lot of fun. Thank you to everyone who came along to the gig.
Ozlem, as expected, was amazing, particularly poised for someone who was performing at her debut headline gig.
I was happy with how my new work came out. I had decided to do one of the new ones in response to something I had heard in the open stage, and it felt a lot better than I thought. Needs a bit of work, perhaps, but certainly held it’s own.
This is mostly for my own recording, but my set list was:
1st Set
Thirteen Hours Into Summer; Sad Bleak Sky; That’s Chiroptera To You Mr. Lawrence; Supermarket Queue; In Memory Of Boris Pasternak (by Denise Levertov); Observing Denise Levertov Remember Boris Pasternak; Inauguration; In The Absence
2nd Set
Dr. Frankenstein; Dust Revisited; Ballard Days; Eulogy For The Polaroid; Extracts From The Kama Sutra Of Sleep; Go; 21 – The World
Reading: “District & Circle” – Seamus Heaney
Listening: “Save What You Can” – The Triffids
Red Lobster
Now I knew of David McLauchlan’s tireless work behind the camera, and his marvellous record of the Melbourne poetry scene that airs on Channel 31 on Thursday nights. For one thing, it’s hard to miss a chap with a proper TV camera asking you to sign release forms after you’ve read.
However, it took a conversation with a colleague at work who saw me on the show (I can’t get Ch. 31 where I live), followed with more talking to fellow poets to discover that not only does the show have a website, but the website has video! He recently put up the Candy Stripes gig that I was part of and you can see it there, along with a bunch of others, some of which include me and a plethora of other magnificent poets.
Red Lobster. Channel 31, Thursdays at 11:30pm or see the website!!
Reading: “Cultural Amnesia” – Clive James
Listening: “Strategy” – Something For Kate
Candy Stripes @ The Candy Bar
Well, I had an excellent evening being part of a great performance at the Candy Bar on last Thursday night. Anthony O’Sullivan (of Spinning Room fame) was an excellent host as per usual, presiding over an enthusiastic turnout.
I was grateful to find that I was opening as it meant I would be less stressed and could enjoy the show in its entirety. This was handy as, apart from Josephine, I had seen little to no of my co-stars previously, knowing them only by reputation, and was able to enjoy their work with fresh ears.
The set list for me was: If Poetry, Mokita, Ballard Days, Eulogy for the Cassette, Eulogy for the Polaroid, Tomorrow’s Ghosts, Concerto in B-Flat for Piano and Phlegm and I finished with XXI – The World
If the night made anything clear to me, it was that I really need to learn how to perform without my notes! Apart from seeing some marvellous performances being done by people who were free of having to look at paper every couple of seconds, it felt a lot better being able to concentrate purely on what I was saying without having to read at the same time.
Photos of the night were taken by Michael Reynolds, who has kindly shared them to the world on this link.
Overload this year produced something of a record for me. Five gigs in one week I think is something of a record in the decade-and-a-bit that I’ve been attending and reading in open stage gigs. By the time Sunday’s closing event rolled around, I was too tired to attend. Hats off the Overload organising committee for bringing in festival number seven!
Podcast plug for Indiefeed
It’s time for me to recommend a podcast.
I’m slowly working my way through the Indiefeed Performance Poetry podcast on my way to work in the mornings. What currently amounts to 300-and-a-bit poems recorded around the slam and open mic gigs of North America (including several recordings from great poets further back in history such as Auden, Ginsberg, Millay, etc.). There’s a wide selection of brilliant poetry of every stripe. This podcast is really worth checking out if you love the spoken word in all its many splendid forms.
The link to the site is http://performancepoetry.indiefeed.com/. Worth getting an iPod for.
It should also be noted that “Words In Your Face: A Guided Tour through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam”, the new book by Cristin O’Keefe-Aptowicz is out and about, the prologue containing none other than the grand Melbournian poet Steve Smart. Sounds like a great book and I may be chasing a copy of it.
This message, may or may not have been brought to you by me entering a competition to win said book. Thus it is I fulfill my new year’s resolution of last year by enteing a poetry competition. Almost.
Listening: Taylor Mali – Labeling Keys
Reading: The Rattle Bag (ed. Ted Hughes & Seamus Heaney)
Dan O’Connell review
Had a fun old time at the Dan as one does. Many thanks to Cam for letting me feature there. I did two sets, opened the first set with Leonard Cohen’s “Democracy“, read some of my older stuff (Hierophant, Basement of Swallows, etc.) finished the first set with W. H. Auden’s “Law Like Love“. The second set opened with Lou Reed’s “Romeo Had Juliette” and then I went through my more recent stuff. Eulogy for the Cassette Tape, The Writer as Goalkeeper, Book Store, Tomorrow’s Ghosts.
Next week at the Dan, I believe we have the very cool Teresa O’Donnell
Fun was had, parents were there to see my gig, Guinness was consumed, all in all, a rather nice Saturday.
Currently Listening : “Days” – Elvis Costello
Melbourne Poets Union
A pleasant Friday night was spent at the Melbourne Poet’s Union. As well as appearances from Jennifer Compton and Paul Mitchell, the evening saw the launch of Carla de Goede’s “Those Hairy Letters”. This is the ninth chapbook to be released through the MPU’s Chapbook Series.
Kris Hemmensley’s speech about the importance of the chapbook in the world of poetry was stirring enough that I wound up writing another poem, I’ll post that here once it’s been polished a bit.
Technorati tags: events, poetry, melbourne poets union
Reading: “Those Hairy Letters” – Carla de Goede
Listening: “American Without Tears” – Elvis Costello (off the King Of America album)
Changes on the blog
A touch of bedlam in Law Like Blog-land as I attempt to get the theme working in concert with all the gadgets I’ve been adding. The look isn’t entirely how I want it, but I’ll tinker with that as time allows.
In other news, I think I’ll be attending the Melbourne Poet’s Union gathering this evening. As well as Jennifer Compton and Paul Mitchell putting in an appearance, Carla de Goede will be launching her book.
Also the Overload Festival kicks off next Friday with a Poet’s Pub Crawl. As John Garrett said last Tuesday night at Spinning Room, the Poet’s Season has begun and will continue through to December.
Listening: “Warnings Moving Clockwise” – Do Re Mi
Reading: “Break Blow Burn” – Camille Paglia
Technorati Tags: poetry, events, announcements
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