I am often asked to provide advice from up and coming poets and
writers on how to “do spoken word” properly or ways to better themselves
as spoken word (i.e. performance) poets. Below is a short but essential
list to get you started.
1. Be True To You!
The best poets speak from an authentic experience or perspective.
Don’t try to speak on something that you know nothing about or can’t
really relate to. It will come across as being unauthentic at best and
pretentious and self-serving at worst. Poetry is something you feel. It
is organic to your soul and before you can have an impact on others it
must be true to you first.
2. Have Something To Say
Here’s a little secret. Most poetry slams and many open mics I don’t
particularly care for. Why? Much of the time the poets focus too much on
shock or catering to the lowest common denominator. I don’t care about
your real or made up sexual exploits, your manufactured anger or your
assorted proclivities. The audience is asking the question “How does
what you say relate to my life?” How are you empowering me or shining a
light on society? How are you celebrating beauty or art? How are you
reminding me of our humanity or our inhumanity to others? Your poetry
should be something of value or at the very least not something of
detriment.
3. Respect and Know Your Audience
“Everything ain’t for everybody” as the saying goes. Know your
audience. Does the poem contain alot of phrases or language that no one
in the audience will really understand or relate to? Are there a bunch
of children in the audience or people whose first language is not the
language of the poem? Also…
Respect your audience! Part
of the reason why I don’t frequent many poetry venues is because I can
only take but so many gratuitous uses of profanity, odes to past lovers
(real or imagined) or obscenities under the guise of “art”. I am not
totally anti-profanity in a poem. Sometimes that is the “realest” and
most appropriate way to relate the truth of a particular piece for some
people. As a rule for myself I never use profanity in my poetry…ever.
But most poets use profanity simply for shock value or more usually due
to a lack of creativity. Can’t think of a sophisticated word?…okay “f
this”. Can’t create true emotion?…true anger in a piece?…okay “bleep
you”. I don’t consider that respecting the audience. People are giving
you their eyes and ears. Respect that. Don’t vomit on the mic. Most
people who like good poetry don’t particularly care for gratuitous foul
language. It’s the nature of the medium…it’s a higher art form.
4. Take Poetry Seriously
If you take a lazy approach to the art form it will come across
amateurish at best and boring and annoying at worst. If you care about
your work the audience will care about you enough to listen to what you
have to say. It will also help you to have a professional look to your
performance. Look at top singers and rappers and you will see a huge
difference between them and those in your typical talent show. Even if
there are only 5 people in the audience (and since you are a poet that
will be the case on many occasions) be professional and hone your craft.
Study poetry. Read poetry. Look at performances of slam poets (though I
don’t often care for the “poetry” of slam poets their energy is a
clinic on good performing) and practice. Practice in a mirror. Look at
how you move (or don’t move). Think of what you do as a craft and become
a craftswoman or craftsman.
5. Slow Down!
You can improve your performance by a factor of 10 by simply speaking
slower. It’s not a race to the finish line. Poetry is not like
listening to music where you can just sort of veg out a bit and just
sort of “groove to the vibes”. Poetry audiences actually need to
understand what you are saying. There is no vegging out.
YOU
ARE THE MUSIC! So take your time and also pause appropriately. There’s
nothing like a strategically placed pause that allows the thought just
completed to marinate a bit. Most performance poets spit out their words
too quickly and you lose people when you do that or cause them to WORK
TOO HARD to keep up with the NASCAR driver of Spoken Word.
6. Under 3 is Key!
3 minutes! That should be your time limit. People have a fairly short
attention span when it comes to performances. This isn’t the 1970’s
where you can have a 12 minute song. This isn’t Jazz where the quartet
will perform one piece for like 22 minutes where everyone gets a solo.
Even I won’t listen to a 12 minute poem! Most of my poems are in that 3
minute range. Because I am a particularly energetic and rhythmic kind of
poet I can get away with an occasional piece that approaches the length
of a modern pop song (4 mins). If you stay under 3 minutes you maintain
the audience’s attention and you don’t start to bore or annoy people.
Note: In Slam poetry your time limit is 3 minutes with point deductions
coming for every 10 seconds over time.
7. Perform, Perform, Perform!
This is performance poetry. Spoken Word by its nature is part
theatrical performance and part monologue. If people wanted someone to
just read poetry from a book with no emotion…no “umph” they could do it
themselves. Spoken Word is PERFORMANCE poetry. That doesn’t mean you
turn into an actor or rapper or singer or comedian though all of those
elements may appear in your work. It means that you have an
understanding that you are bringing the words and feelings to life. But
keep in mind the earlier points of being “true to you” so that your
performance doesn’t come off as a drama class exercise.
8. Memorize Your Stuff
The single greatest technical change I made as a poet was to memorize
my stuff. It was so freeing! And being that I incorporate a great deal
of movement when I perform it was especially beneficial for me to
memorize my poetry. I was no longer encumbered by having to hold a piece
of paper or stand in front of a podium. But even for people who are
less physical on stage memorizing your poetry does several things that
benefit you:
- You can see your audience and therefore connect with them.
- Connecting with your audience through eye contact allows them to see your emotion better and relate to you.
- The paper and the mic stand create an unwanted barrier between you and the audience.
- It removes a “crutch”. You don’t have that paper to fall back on and makes you a stronger poet.
- It removes an obstacle. How many times have you seen a poet flub or skip a line because they missed their place?
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