spoken word | applesandsnakesblog.org

Blurring the Boundaries between theatre and poetry by Nick Field

Apples and Snakes’ Poet Of The Month, Nick Field, talks about blurring the boundaries between theatre and poetry…

I love blurring the boundaries.

I’m also always drawn to experimenting with blurring the boundaries in my work, between forms often, but other ways too; structure and genre are favoured playthings. As an artist it is in forming and causing these mutations between different arts that I find the most exciting creative potential. While my work as a writer and performer has been on quite a journey in recent years, poetry is …

HOME COOKING SEASON 4: THE EUROPEAN SPOKEN WORD FAMILY

The fourth season of Home Cooking podcasts commissioned by Apples and Snakes focuses on Europe, hear from poets and collectives across England…

This month, Berlin based spoken word artist Pete the Temp interviews poets and promoters in France, Germany and the Netherlands while touring there. He asks why British poets should visit mainland Europe and how they can do it.

www.petethetemp.co.uk | @PeteTheTemp | www.facebook.com/Petethetemp…

FORKED: A Review

Nestled in the cobbled streets of the Barbican, surrounded by velvet curtains and candle light, you will find the FORKED poets ready and waiting to entertain… FORKED first-timer, Seren Kiremitcioglu, reviews Plymouth’s favourite spoken word night…

On a rather drizzly and wet Thursday 19 May, I made my way over to The B-Bar in Plymouth with my good friend by my side; sitting down in the warm, inviting room with Thai food and beer in hand, I fully enjoyed a night of entertaining, insightful and thought-provoking performances of poetry …

Antosh Wojcik – Beyond The Voice In Spoken Word: How Soundscape Furthers Poetic Discourse

Apples and Snakes’ Poet of the Month for June, Antosh Wojcik, talks about the transformative power of soundscape in performance poetry…

I’ve always had the frustration of being incomplete in sound as a drummer. I can only be answered by other people, who react in melodies and tunes. I think this was one of my motivations for pursuing poetry and its performance; it allows me to enact the visual landscapes I have in my head into sound, for other people. It’s been through the process of developing my performance of …

Archive Excavation – Lydia Tomkiw

Spoken Word Archive coordinator, Russell Thompson, has been digging deep into the artform to unearth the puzzle pieces of its history. Here’s the latest relic from his #ArchiveExcavation…

Being an archivist is great. I like it when people ask ‘Yes, but what do you actually do?’ Well, right now I’m spending a lot of time linked up to a cassette-player and at least three pairs of headphones, digitising audio-recordings of Apples and Snakes’ shows from the 1980s and ‘90s. And when I’m not tripping over leads or watching digitisation training …

Roger Robinson: Music & Poetry

Co-curator of Straight Out The Box and all-round poetry legend, Roger Robinson, gives us a run-down of his top ten inspirational tracks, showing the combined power of music and poetry…

Here are the ten poetry and music collaborations that made me realise that poetry wasn’t just in books.
These tracks have affected my life and my thoughts. Some of them for more than decade.
I hope you enjoy.

1. Antipop Consortium : Rinseflow

2. Trimbal : Confidence Boost

3. Saul Williams / DJ Krush : Coded Language

4. Mike Ladd …

Straight Out The Box: The Review

Writer and blogger Kaysha Woollery takes us through an evening of box fresh words and music as she relives the first ever Straight Out The Box at Pop Brixton…

When I first heard “Straight Out the Box”, I pictured a Jack-in-a-Box and envisaged an evening of being terrorised by clowns – the very essence of my worst nightmares. I went anyway because I had a free ticket, and I’m glad I did. Let’s set the scene. We’re in a shipping container, fairy lights are twinkling, the sound check …

Talia Randall – Twisted tongues, innuendo and bumbling grammar; the foundations of my spoken word.

Apples and Snakes’ Poet of The Month for May, Talia Randall, talks about the unique power of Spoken Word, and her new show Bloodlines…

A foreign mother.
Dyslexia.
Substandard English education.

These are the things that make spoken word my home.

I don’t know nothing about grammar. I’m not well-read. I don’t have any training in writing, performance, nothing.

But…

I come from a people whose language was nomadic; who carried entangled tongues across Europe and the Middle East. They stuffed their saddlebags with syllables and idioms. Like …

Kim Moore – Picture the Poet in Carlisle

Poet Kim Moore tells us about the inspirational work of Dove Cottage Young Poets as part of the National Portrait Gallery’s Picture the Poet exhibition in Carlisle…

When Apples and Snakes got in touch to ask if I’d be interested in running some workshops around the Picture the Poet exhibition, I was really excited, and even more excited about the opportunity to run the workshops with the Dove Cottage Young Poets, a group of young writers that I’ve been working with for the last couple of years.

Dove Cottage …

Jum Faruq: Magic in Arvon

Jum Faruq blogs about 15 inner city poets, sent out into the depths of the British countryside for 5 days of hardcore poetry writing, bound by the laws of digital detox, outnumbered by sheep and facing new levels of unpolluted air – will they make it out alive?

Sharpen your pencils, this is Lumb Bank 2016 *cue hans zimmer soundtrack*. Okay, so it might not have been as dramatic as the trailer begets: the air was airsquisite (ahem), the fluffy sheep kept at a safe distance and *spoiler alert* we …