Cantab Feature for Wednesday, January 21, 2015: Jason Carney

Jason Carney, Dallas slam legend.

Jason Carney, Dallas slam legend.

Jason Carney, a poet, writer, and educator from Dallas, Texas, is a four-time National Poetry Slam Finalist, honored as a Legend of the Slam in 2007. He appeared on three seasons of the HBO television series Russell Simmons’ Def Poets. Jason has performed and lectured at some of our nation’s finest colleges and universities as well as high schools and juvenile detention centers from California to Maine. A graduate of Wilkes University MFA Program for Creative Writing, where he was an honored winner of the Etruscan Prize, the Bergman Foundation Scholarship, and the Norris Church-Mailer Scholarship. He is Co-founder and Artistic Director of the non-profit Young DFW Writers. His memoir, Starve the Vulture, will be released on Akashic/Kaylie Jones Books in January 2015 and has been optioned for film by Storefront Pictures.

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. The Last Chance Slam, the final open poetry slam to qualify for the 2015 Boston Poetry Slam Team, will follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.

Cantab Recap for Wednesday, January 14, 2015

The new year doesn’t let up, poetry slam fans! Our second Wednesday of 2015 was a grand celebration, featuring the dynamic and very entertaining Pages Matam; Pages rocked the house, tugged at some heartstrings, and even gave away a custom bow-tie after a 90-second audience physical challenge. We wish him the best of luck and fun as his tour continues west!

Following Pages, of course, was the highly anticipated Champion of Champions poetry slam, featuring a field of seven previous winners, all fighting for a chance to take on the reigning champ, Sean Patrick Mulroy. It was a wicked good field, perhaps best illustrated by the final season championship matchup between Ed Wilkinson and Meaghan Ford; after a hot final round, the two longtime competitors actually TIED, forcing a tie-breaker match! Ed took the tiebreaker and went on to not-very-reluctantly challenge Sean for the crown… However, Sean’s surprise new work performed in the final round got the edge over Ed’s fifth (!) performance of the night, earning Ed an opportunity to shake his fist at Sean’s continued dominion over the venue.

Next week: we’re back with the Last Chance Slam, the very final chance to get on the qualifying roster for the Boston Poetry Team Selection Slams. Oh, wait, you were wondering who the headliner is? It’ll be none other than Jason Carney, a four-time National Poetry Slam Finalist so classy he uses a pic of himself upstairs at the Cantab as the iconic image on his website. Come welcome this Texas sensation to our basement stage for the first time.

Tips from the Bar: Emily O’s Debut

Write about one of your personal hells.

Cantab Feature for January 14, 2015: Pages Matam and the Champion of Champions Slam

Pages Matam, DC-Cameroonian poet.

Pages Matam, DC-Cameroonian poet.

Pages Matam is a multidimensional creative writing and performance artist, residing in the D.C. metropolitan area, but originally from Cameroon, Africa. He is an author, educator, activist, playwright, host, event organizer, award-winning slam poet, and his greatest accomplishment, being a father. A proud gummy bear elitist, bow-tie enthusiast, professional hugger and anime fanatic, be prepared to be taken on a journey of cultural and personal discovery unapologetic in its silly, yet visceral and beautifully honest in its storytelling.

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. The Champions of Champions Slam in the 8×8 speed slam series will follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.

Cantab Recap for Wednesday, January 7, 2015

Folks, if you are ever planning a party at your place, like the sort of party you would normally have every week except you took two weeks off for holidays, and also the night of the party turns out to be really cold, like actually below zero, you should definitely invite Rachel McKibbens to your party, because then everyone will definitely come. A toast and a thanks to the brave souls who came out on the coldest day of the winter (so far… yikes) to listen in to Rachel’s “B-sides” feature: a vulnerable and honest set of her work spanning three books, including more than a few poems she rarely voices aloud. We are honored to be one of Rachel’s poetry homes and hope to welcome her to the venue again this year.

Our slam that night marked the very last of our current 8×8 series (and the second-to-last qualifier for the 2015 team!), so there was plenty of interest in that crumpled $10 bill Sean Mulroy was offering the winners. The final head-to-head came down to Josh Elbaum and Sophia Holtz, both clearly holding nothing back to take the top spot: despite a strong showing in a tiebreaker in the semi-final round, Josh ultimately fell to Sophia’s Jersey-centric comedic finale, rocketing her to the Champion of Champions round next week.

Wait, that’s next week?? You betcha! The past eight slam winners will take on the reigning champ, the aforementioned oft-times slam host Sean Mulroy, in a winner-take-all 8×8 championship match next Wednesday! Our headlining poet that night will be Cameroonian-born D.C. poet and bow-tie enthusiast Pages Matam. See you there!

Tips from the Bar: The Oz Prompt

Write a poem that’s intentionally, terribly bad. Don’t be a bastard. Finish with the audience liking you.

Moonlighting: A Queer Open Mic and Reading Series Featuring Aly Pearce on January 8, 2015 (Special SECOND Thursday!)

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

Note that this month’s Moonlighting event takes place on January 8, the SECOND Thursday of the month.

Aly Pearce, UMass Boston MFA candidate.

Aly Pearce, UMass Boston MFA candidate.

The featured reader for January 8 is Aly Pierce. Aly Pearce is a crafter, a Cancer, and a pursuer of one too many ill-advised road trips this year. She graduated from Hampshire College in 2011 with a BA in creative writing, video, and sorting buttons. She is getting her MFA from UMass Boston in Poetry and lives in Salem, Mass. She is getting a black cat.

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.

Cantab Feature for Wednesday, January 7, 2015: Rachel McKibbens

Rachel McKibbens, widely published and highly acclaimed poet.

Rachel McKibbens, widely published and highly acclaimed poet.

Poet and activist Rachel McKibbens is a New York Foundation for the Arts poetry fellow and author of the critically acclaimed full-length volumes of poetry, Pink Elephant (Small Doggies Press) and Into the Dark & Emptying Field (Small Doggies Press) as well as the chapbook MAMMOTH (Organic Weapon Arts.) Regarded as one of the most dynamic poetry readers in the country, McKibbens is a nine-time National Poetry Slam team member (including a stint with the Boston Poetry Slam in 2011), the 2009 Women of the World Poetry Slam champion and the 2011 National Underground Poetry Slam individual champion.

McKibbens’ poetry has been described as “marked by an arresting sense of the human spirit as unbroken, despite incredible suffering.” The Rumpus wrote of Pink Elephant, “McKibbens awakens and haunts with selfless honesty.”

McKibbens resides in upstate New York where she teaches poetry and co-curates the monthly reading series Poetry & Pie Night. She is currently working on a memoir about growing up as a child misogynist.

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.

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