Thanks for a Great 2014!

The Boston Poetry Slam would like to wish everyone an excellent calandrical New Year. As always, we are proud and honored to have brought poetry to thousands of listeners over the course of 2014, as well as space for hundreds of poets to perform. Our most timely thanks go to the poets of the Haley House Slam and the Boston Poetry Slam who, under the hosting team of respective SlamMasters Janae Johnson and Simone Beaubien, collaborated to put on a great series of demo slams at Boston’s First Night for New Year’s Eve! What a wonderful way to ring in the next wave of poetry in the city.

If you’ve stopped by wondering what we’ll be up to in 2015, you’ll probably want to start by clicking here to find the upcoming schedule for all the Boston Poetry Slam’s shows; you’ll see in the sidebar that our next Cantab event will feature Rachel McKibbens on January 7 and our next Moonlighting event will be headlined by Aly Pearce on January 8.

If you’re interested in trying your hand at poetry on one of our stages, you can get details on the Cantab open mic, the Cantab open slam, or the Moonlighting open mic right here as well. We’ve tried to answer all your questions about times, locations, costs, and age restrictions, but if you can’t find what you are looking for, try taking a peek at our comprehensive FAQ.

Lastly, if you are looking for more shows in the Boston area, you should know that we are far from the only show in town! Currently, the two other PSI-accredited slams in town are the aforementioned Haley House Slam (twice monthly in JP) and the Lizard Lounge Poetry Jam (weekly in Cambridge), but there are many, many other open poetry options on both sides of the river. For the short list of slams, readings, and communities we are close with, scroll down and check out the links in our sidebar.

Once again, thanks to everyone who helped make our 2014 wonderful. Here’s wishing you a poetry-filled 2015!

Wednesday, December 31, 2014: Celebrate First Night with Poetry Slam Downtown

There will be no poetry show at the Cantab Lounge tonight! Instead, we’ll be traveling across the river to First Night Boston, the city’s annual family-friendly New Year’s Eve celebration:
http://www.firstnightboston.org/

The Boston Poetry Slam has produced family-friendly, star-studded demonstration slams at Boston’s First Night since 1995! This year will be no exception, as the Boston Poetry Slam will collaborate with the Haley House Slam to bring you the best performance poets from all over the Charles River basin, all hosted by Simone Beaubien and Janae Johnson, with special guest Porsha Olayiwola. Come check us out from 7:30-11pm in room 103 at the Hynes Convention Center, 900 Boylston St. in Boston; you’ll need to buy a First Night button to get in, which covers all the shows in the Hynes that night.

Our slam schedule for the night is as follows (subject to change):

Bout 1: 7:30 to 8:05
sacrifice: Jha D.
Melissa Lozada-Oliva
Cole Rodriguez
Sean Patrick Mulroy
Sophia Holtz
hosted by Simone Beaubien

Bout 2: 8:15 to 8:50
with live ASL interpretation!
sacrifice: Sophia Holtz
Melissa Lozada-Oliva
Marshall Gillson
Sean Patrick Mulroy
Meaghan Ford
hosted by Janae Johnson

Bout 3: 9:00 to 9:35
with live ASL interpretation!
sacrifice: Janae Johnson
Nora Meiners
Marshall Gillson
Meaghan Ford
Zeke Russell
hosted by Simone Beaubien

Bout 4: 9:45 to 10:20
sacrifice: D. Ruff
Tru Kwene
Febo
Zeke Russell
Rudy Rudacious
hosted by Janae Johnson

Bout 5: 10:30 to 11:00
sacrifice: Febo
Tru Kwene
D. Ruff
Nora Meiners
Rudy Rudacious
hosted by Simone Beaubien

For more information, check out our info on the official First Night website.

No matter where you head on Wednesday the Last, we hope you enjoy your Eve! Please come back to see us with new work in the New Year. You can see our upcoming shows page for the schedule:
http://bostonpoetryslam.com/see-a-show/weekly-show/upcoming-features-and-slams

Cantab for Wednesday, December 24, 2014: NO SHOW TONIGHT

No poetry show tonight! Enjoy a night off and come see us with new work in the New Year.

Please see our upcoming shows page for the schedule:
http://bostonpoetryslam.com/see-a-show/weekly-show/upcoming-features-and-slams

Cantab Recap for Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Thanks for an excellent 2014, Boston Poetry Slammers. We were super-pleased to welcome beloved MC Emeritus, many-time slam team member, all-star open-mic poet, and one-time near-weekly judge Brian S. Ellis back to the stage for a year-end feature this past Wednesday. Brian read a few from his latest, American Dust Revisited, but also brought us a selection of new and newer work for the feature slot. What a joy to have Brian return for the night; thanks to everyone who brought great work to the open mic to close the year.

Our last slam of the year was packed with some folks who were either showing off for the feature or really looking for those last Yankee Swap points for our Team Selection Slams… Either way, Ellyn Touchette and Meaghan Ford burned all the way through the three rounds, with Meaghan taking the top spot for the finish. Just two slams left to qualify for the team!

Next Wednesday: we are OFF for some kind of holiday or something. In fact, we won’t be back at the Cantab until January 7 for Rachel McKibbens, and even Moonlighting has been pushed out to January 8 for Bobby Crawford’s feature! However, folks who are in town for New Year’s Eve can still catch us across the river at Boston’s First Night; this year, we’re teaming up with the Haley House Slam for some all-star family friendly slam fun. Hope to see you there!

Tips from the Bar: The Brian S. Ellis Prompt

From the news: someone has destroyed a famous work of art by punching it. You are in charge of restoring the piece. What do you do?

Or, from Brian: what piece of art would YOU punch?

Cantab Feature for Wednesday, December 17, 2014: Brian S. Ellis

The long-lost Brian S. Ellis. Photo by Robert Duncan Gray.

The long-lost Brian S. Ellis. Photo by Robert Duncan Gray.

Brian S. Ellis is a writer born in New Hampshire and raised on Cape Cod who became a poet while attending a weekly open mic at the Cantab Lounge. He is the author of three collections of poetry: Uncontrolled Experiments in Freedom, Yesterday Won’t Goodbye, and American Dust Revisited. He currently lives in Portland, Oregon.

This show in our weekly Wednesday series takes place at the Cantab Lounge, 738 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge. Doors for the show open at 7:15. The open mic begins at 8:00 and the feature performs at approximately 10:00. An open poetry slam in the 8×8 series will follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.

Cantab Recap for Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Sometimes, Cantabbers, a poet comes through at just the right time with just the thing you need. Our very special thanks to the champion of our faces, Mike McGee, who rolled us gently through a love-poem set last Wednesday, taking us backwards in time from breakup to first blush. Beautiful! Our six-poet slam took a few romantic cues from Mike’s set, but progressed markedly forwards from six poets down to two, where Colin Killick and Mckendy Fils-Aimé fought for the penultimate ten-dollar prize of 2014. Mckendy took the big win, securing his spot in the upcoming Boston Poetry Slam Team Preliminaries this coming January. Awesome!

Next week, December 17 will be our LAST CANTAB SHOW OF THE YEAR, people: we’ll be taking a break on December 24 and slamming as part of Boston’s First Night on December 31. That means we have to finish our December bar shows with a bang: and, as you know, you can’t spell Brian! S! Ellis! without a whole lotta fireworks. Show up early for our last 2014 Cantab show and first real feature with Brian since his move to Portland, Oregon years ago. Those of you looking for extra year-end spending money can try for the ten bucks riding on that night’s open slam, too.

Tips from the Bar: The Bobby Crawford Prompt

Tell us about the celebrity(/ies?!) you did not quite run over with your car.

Cantab Feature for Wednesday, December 10, 2014: Mike McGee

Mike McGee, champion of pretty much everything.

Mike McGee, champion of pretty much everything.

Mike McGee is the first poet to win both the National Poetry Slam Individual Championship (2003) and the Individual World Poetry Slam Championship (2006). He has toured over 600,000 miles and once lived in Worcester, Mass. for a year, where he initiated the now-nationwide movement known as Kitchen Sessions. Born in Fort Campbell, Kentucky with a mild form of Spina Bifida, Mike considers this neural tube defect to be one of the foundations and origins of his love of humor, art and language. He is the eldest of eight children.

In 2003, McGee co-founded the Vancouver, B.C.-based “talk-rock” trio Tons of Fun University with Shane Koyczan and C. R. Avery. Their debut was before a crowd of 15,000 at the Vancouver Folk Music Festival, July 2004. The trio has since toured extensively throughout Canada, performing primarily in music festivals. In 2005, McGee performed a revised version of his popular poem “Like” on a fifth season episode of Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry on HBO. He currently lives in San Diego.

Peter Storey, drifter and poet.

Peter Storey, drifter and poet.

Tonight’s show will also feature a spotlight from Peter Storey. Peter is a drifter. He fights wildfire to pay for time to write. This winter he lives in Chicago. By the summer he’ll be gone.

This show in our weekly Wednesday series takes place at the Cantab Lounge, 738 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge. Doors for the show open at 7:15. The open mic begins at 8:00 and the feature performs at approximately 10:00. An open poetry slam in the 8×8 series will follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.

Moonlighting: A Queer Open Mic and Reading Series Featuring Bobby Crawford on December 4, 2014

This reading is part of our monthly LGBTQ series, Moonlighting. Click here for more information about this recurring show.

The featured reader for December 4 is Bobby Crawford.

The elusive Bobby Crawford. Photo by Marshall Goff.

The elusive Bobby Crawford. Photo by Marshall Goff.

Bobby Crawford is the “one-man-boy-band” of Emerson College. Bobby competed on three consecutive College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational teams representing Emerson (2011-2013). He also served as a curator of the Emerson Poetry Project from 2012-2013, where he was instrumental in helping the EPP win Emerson’s Student Organization of the Year. Bobby competed at the 2013 National Poetry Slam with the Mill City Slam team from Lowell, Mass. and represented the Boston Poetry Slam at the 2013 Individual World Poetry Slam in Spokane, Wash., ranking 15th out of 70. A competitor and showman by instinct, Bobby is a retired nationally-ranked figure skater and a former chess-club kid. He plays harmonica and wears a leather jacket.

This show in our monthly Thursday LGBTQ series takes place at Fazenda Coffee Roasters, 3710 Washington St. in the Jamaica Plain area of Boston. An open mic begins at approximately 7:00 p.m. and the headliner follows the open mic. The show is all-ages and a $3 donation is requested.