Sedona Poetry Slam moves to the Alice Gill-Sheldon Theatre for second slam of the season Saturday, Dec. 5

The Sedona Poetry Slam’s 18th season continues Saturday Dec. 5 with a change of scenery: the second slam of the year shifts down the hall to the Alice Gill-Sheldon Theatre starting at 7:30 p.m. Performance poets will bring high-energy competitive spoken word to the intimate room for one night only before the slam returns to its usual home in the new year.

With the holidays closing in poets are expected to bring everything from wry gift-giving satire to reflective end-of-year verse as they compete for cash prizes and bragging rights.

Open Slam

A poetry slam is like a series of high-energy three-minute one-person plays judged by the audience. Slam poetry is an art form that allows written page poets to share their work alongside theatrical performers hip-hop artists and lyricists.

Poets come from as far away as Phoenix Tucson Prescott and Flagstaff competing against local poets from Sedona and Cottonwood college poets from Northern Arizona University and youth poets from Verde Valley high schools. All types of poetry are welcome on the stage from street-wise hip-hop and narrative performance poems to political rants and introspective confessionals. Any poem is a “slam” poem if performed in a competition. All poets get three minutes per round to entertain and inspire the audience with their creativity.

Anyone can sign up to compete in the slam for the $75 grand prize and $25 second-place prize. To compete in the slam poets will need three original poems each lasting no longer than three minutes. No props costumes nor musical accompaniment are permitted. The poets are judged Olympics-style by five members of the audience selected at random at the beginning of the slam.

Email host Christopher Fox Graham at foxthepoet@yahoo.com to sign up early to compete or by the Friday before the slam or sign up at the door the day of the slam. Poets who want to compete should purchase a ticket in case the roster is filled before they arrive.

Tickets and Venue

The Alice Gill-Sheldon Theatre is located at 2030 W. SR 89A in West Sedona in the same complex as the Mary D. Fisher Theatre. Tickets are $12 in advance or $15 at the door. For tickets call 928-282-1177 or visit SedonaFilmFestival.org.

Upcoming Slams

The next poetry slams will be held on Saturdays, Feb. 13, March 6, April 17 and May 22 at the Mary D. Fisher Theatre.

The prize money is funded in part by a donation from Verde Valley poetry supporters Jeanne and Jim Freeland.

For more information visit sedonafilmfestival.com or foxthepoet.blogspot.com. For a full list of slam poetry events in Arizona visit azpoet.com or the Arizona State Poetry Society at azpoetry.net..

What is Poetry Slam?

Founded at the Green Mill Tavern in Chicago in 1984 by Marc Smith poetry slam is a competitive artistic sport designed to get people who would otherwise never go to a poetry reading excited about the art form when it becomes a high-energy competition. Poetry slams are judged by five randomly chosen members of the audience who assign numerical value to individual poets’ contents and performances.

Poetry slam has become an international artistic sport with more than 100 major poetry slams in the United States Canada Australia and Western Europe. Slam poets have opened at the Winter Olympics performed at the White House and at the United Nations General Assembly and were featured on “Russell Simmons’ Def Poets” on HBO.

Sedona has sent four-poet teams to represent the city at the National Poetry Slam in Charlotte N.C. Boston Cambridge Mass. Oakland Calif. Decatur Ga. Denver and Chicago.

Sedona Poetry Slam kicks off 18th season Saturday, Oct. 10 — on the set of “The Dead Quilters Society”

The Sedona Poetry Slam opens its 18th season on Saturday, Oct. 10, with a twist: The first slam of the year takes the stage on the set of “The Dead Quilters Society,” the play being staged at the Mary D. Fisher Theatre that weekend and the next. Performance poets will bring high-energy, competitive spoken word to the theater starting at 7:30 p.m.

Poets will compete for cash prizes on a set built for the popular Sedona historical play — a  collision of page, stage and improvised scenery that regulars say only adds to the show.

Open Slam

A poetry slam is like a series of high-energy three-minute one-person plays judged by the audience. Slam poetry is an art form that allows written page poets to share their work alongside theatrical performers hip-hop artists and lyricists.

Poets come from as far away as Phoenix Tucson Prescott and Flagstaff competing against local poets from Sedona and Cottonwood college poets from Northern Arizona University and youth poets from Verde Valley high schools. All types of poetry are welcome on the stage from street-wise hip-hop and narrative performance poems to political rants and introspective confessionals. Any poem is a “slam” poem if performed in a competition. All poets get three minutes per round to entertain and inspire the audience with their creativity.

Anyone can sign up to compete in the slam for the $75 grand prize and $25 second-place prize. To compete in the slam poets will need three original poems each lasting no longer than three minutes. No props costumes nor musical accompaniment are permitted — except, for this one night, the play’s own quilting-themed backdrop, which stays put. The poets are judged Olympics-style by five members of the audience selected at random at the beginning of the slam.

Email host Christopher Fox Graham at foxthepoet@yahoo.com to sign up early to compete or by the Friday before the slam or sign up at the door the day of the slam. Poets who want to compete should purchase a ticket in case the roster is filled before they arrive.

Tickets and Venue

The Mary D. Fisher Theatre is located at 2030 W. SR 89A Suite A-3 in West Sedona. Tickets are $12 in advance or $15 at the door. For tickets call 928-282-1177 or visit SedonaFilmFestival.org.

Upcoming Slams

The next poetry slams will be held on Saturdays, Dec. 5 at the Alice Gill-Sheldon Theatre, and Feb. 13, March 6, April 17 and May 22 at the Mary D. Fisher Theatre.

The prize money is funded in part by a donation from Verde Valley poetry supporters Jeanne and Jim Freeland.

For more information visit sedonafilmfestival.com or foxthepoet.blogspot.com. For a full list of slam poetry events in Arizona visit azpoet.com or the Arizona State Poetry Society at azpoetry.net..

What is Poetry Slam?

Founded at the Green Mill Tavern in Chicago in 1984 by Marc Smith poetry slam is a competitive artistic sport designed to get people who would otherwise never go to a poetry reading excited about the art form when it becomes a high-energy competition. Poetry slams are judged by five randomly chosen members of the audience who assign numerical value to individual poets’ contents and performances.

Poetry slam has become an international artistic sport with more than 100 major poetry slams in the United States Canada Australia and Western Europe. Slam poets have opened at the Winter Olympics performed at the White House and at the United Nations General Assembly and were featured on “Russell Simmons’ Def Poets” on HBO.

Sedona has sent four-poet teams to represent the city at the National Poetry Slam in Charlotte N.C. Boston Cambridge Mass. Oakland Calif. Decatur Ga. Denver and Chicago.

Poetry open mic returns to Sedona

Spoken word and performance poetry returns to Sedona with the Sedona Poetry Open Mic, from 8 to 10 p.m., on the first and third Tuesdays of the month. The event kicks off on Tuesday, April 3.
The open mic takes place on the at the Old Marketplace stage, 1370 W. Hwy. 89A, West Sedona, between The Martini Bar and Ravenheart Coffee, both of which will supply coffee and alcoholic for the audience.
The open mic is open to all types of spoken word artists, from page poets, slam poets, spoken word artists, performance artists, storytellers and comedians.
The open mic is co-hosted by Greg Nix and Christopher Fox Graham, both of Sedona.
Originally from Atlanta and a veteran of the Flagstaff poetry scene, Nix is a performance poet and writer whose use of satire, sarcasm, irony and humor interplay with his political sensibilities and social commentary with a Southern sense of sincerity, according to a press release.
Graham is a slam poet whose work blends romantic longing, confessional honesty and personal introspection with a touch of Arizona humor, according to the release.
A veteran of the metro Phoenix and Flagstaff slam scenes, Graham has represented Northern Arizona as a member of four National Poetry Slam teams, won the 2004 NORAZ Grand Slam and the 2005 Arizona All-Star Slam.
The Martini Bar, Ravenheart Coffee New Frontiers Natural Marketplace will offer gift certificates for the best poets, as chosen by the audience.
The event is sponsored by the GumptionFest Artistic Support Foundation, a coalition of artists dedicated to supporting the arts in the Verde Valley.
For more information, call The Martini Bar at 282-9288, Graham at 1-520-921-0075 or visit www.gumptionfest.com

On April 20, 1999, during the Kosovo war, Kosovar Albanian poet Flora Brovina was abducted by eight masked Serb paramilitaries. On 9 Dec. 9, 1999, in a show trial, she was accused of 'terrorist activities' under Article 136 of the Yugoslav Penal Code. She spent a year and a half in Serb prisons before being released as a result of international pressure.

Irina Ratushinskaya (Ири́на Ратуши́нская), born 1954, was arrested in 1979 and charged with anti-Soviet agitation for "the dissemination of slanderous documentation in poetic form." She was released on the eve of the summit in Reykjavík, Iceland, between President Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in October 1986.

John O'Leary (1830 - 1907) was an Irish poet and Fenian (patriot in the Irish republican movement). In 1865, O'Leary was arrested in England, and tried on charges of conspiracy. He was sentenced to twenty years' penal servitude, of which nine years were spent in English prisons prior to his exile to Paris in 1874.

In 1990, the Burmese military junta charged Myo Myint Nyein, editor of Pay Phu Hlwar magazine and poet, with "organizing youths and students to create instability" through articles in the publication. While in prison, Myo Myint Nyein and other incarcerated colleagues clandestinely formed the "Press Freedom Movement". Because of his involvement in the "Press Freedom Movement", Myo Myint Nyein was sentenced to an additional seven years of hard labor.

Armando Valladares was a political prisoner and prisoner of conscience in Cuba. Valladares was jailed in 1960, at age 23, when the new regime under Fidel Castro began to crack down on dissidents. Valladares's refusal to participate in any political rehabilitation programs elicited a response from the government - 46 days without food. His weakened muscles relegated him to a wheelchair for 5 years. Valladares spent 22 years in prison before being released in 1982 and moving to the United States. President Ronald Reagan appointed Valladares to serve as the US ambassador to the United Nations Human Rights Commission. As head of the US delegation, he successfully brought Cuba before the commission for its human rights violations. Reagan would later confer on him the nation's highest civil honor, the Presidential Citizens Medal. Statistics about bullets acquired from the BBC.
Statistics on violence acquired from the BBC.