Film made by Myles McAuliffe and Gustav Newby of Broken Antenna.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Following a successful run of our play, “The Passersby”, in summer 2010, SPID, an award-winning film and theatre company based in Ladbroke Grove, is looking to tour “The Passersby” to four London venues in late August – early September 2012.

The Passersby is a modern Good Samaritan story, from the perspective of everyday young people living in West London. The actors perform in close proximity to the audience, which challenges them to find a style more real and connected to their own life experiences.

We will be casting the production over the next week and are looking for young people of all ethnicities, aged 13-21 years old, although applications from people above this range will still be considered.

We will be looking for people to start immediately and commit to rehearsing every week until the performance in early September. We are based in Ladbroke Grove/Kensal Rise. This is an unpaid opportunity, but travel and lunch expenses will be covered. No experience necessary.

For more information, please email rebecca.abbott@live.co.uk

I just saw a guitar floating down the Thames

You played that song for her,
And now you’ll never play again!
And she picked up his guitar,
And she flung it in the Thames.
Now it was drifting past me,
A sad and dirty swan,
With a neck held low in shame,
Playing only river songs.

We need a few more shots!
Please just lean backwards; rock and roll!
The guitar slipped away  for a soggy stroll;
An escape from Jack and Coke -
It never minded the odd toke,
But it was worried for its sanity,
And now it sought serenity:
The life of a slow boat;
And it was happy just to float.

You mean nothing but frustration!
I can’t play you – so damnation!
And he dropped it overboard,
With one last weed-infested chord
That sounded sweet as icy springs.
He had made the guitar sing,
But oh! Too late! The echo faded,
And the guitar – well, it couldn’t swim;
Couldn’t breaststroke back to him.
Aah! It gently weeps, he said,
But he had made the watery bed
In which it sailed; he’d failed;
And the guitar was laughing to be free,
No strings attached, and heading for the sea.

Your time has come, my sweetest friend.
Her tears soaked into varnish,
Yellow, wrinkled with old age.
Your score has reached its final page.
Sleep sound; let waters take you.
I can’t let any stranger break you.
With the tiniest of pushes,
She cast it from the shore,
The guitar that needed rest;
The guitar that she would play no more.

I just saw a guitar, acoustic,
Floating down the Thames,
Playing its lonely game of Poohsticks.
Why? Where from? I’ll never know
What tunes it hums as it sinks below,
In a damp diminuendo, after the Embankment’s bend.
I watch the mainstream take it to the bridge,
And silently applaud as its rippling music  ♪♪♪ ends.

Brenda Read-Brown
brendaread-brown.co.uk

On my way to London I worried that I wouldn’t have anything to write about, wouldn’t notice anything new. After all, I was only making a flying visit to the slam final. Besides, I wrote a lot about youth slam and spoken word two years ago after WordCup 2010. I needn’t have worried. After sneaking out of the Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall on my way to other engagements, I wrote almost constantly for the entire train journey home. 2 ¼ hours, 1 pen and 19 A5 pages later, I was stopped only by my train arriving at its destination. Here are some of my thoughts…

Keeping Calm and Carrying On at the Southbank Centre
I’m heading home from the Shake the Dust slam final, overflowing with words and energy and, yes, love; all that ‘slam family’ nonsense that’s easy to dismiss from the cynical outside-looking-in. I had been hit by the slamily vibe pretty much as soon as I caught sight of the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the venue for the final weekend of this youth slam project. Before I’d entered the building, Dreadlockalien (one of the poet coaches and a regional ‘slam consultant’) had grabbed me and I was absorbed into the bubble of chaos that was Shake the Dust.

Walking around the hall itself was like trying to leave my own birthday party. There was no chance of slinking around unnoticed and no possibility of escaping the warmth and (exhausted) enthusiasm of young poets, their tutors and entourage. Once again, I was struck by how ‘centre of attention’ youth slam/spoken word events like this can make you feel. It’s impossible to evade the notion that you are important, that your actions are meaningful, that people are glad you’re there. You know it isn’t about you really, but it is, because it’s about everyone – all those voices, smiles and ideas spinning together. This all sounds unfeasibly fluffy, I know, and I’m a cynic right down to my slushy, heart, but you can’t fail to be captivated by this magic.

One of the things that struck me most was how this slam family has grown since WordCup 2010. New connections have become old friends, pre-existing friendships have strengthened, nascent poetry groups have fledged or passed the slam baton on to the next generation. I’ll admit to a slight dampening of the eye when I bumped into one young poet, Damani. Damani was one of the WordCup slammers I spoke to back in 2010. I swear he was about 2 foot shorter then, but his dazzling smile was unaltered and unmistakeable. In 2010, he told me that he would be back for ‘the next one’ as a poet mentor, and he proved true to his word. When I reminded him of this, he said that many of his dreams had come true since WordCup. He is now a peer mentor and young author, writing and performing regularly in his role as Birmingham Young Poet Laureate. A couple of hours later, Damani was stood on the stage of the Queen Elizabeth Hall theatre, performing a poem about striving to achieve your dreams. It couldn’t have been more fitting.

It is notable that a young man like Damani would dream of being a poet at all, let alone achieve this dream so compellingly. This is the continuity of impact that I wrote about at the end of WC 2010; the continuity that is achieved despite erratic funding and a lingering popular conception that poetry is the dull product of a by-gone age. It’s a continuity charged by the dedication and belief of the teachers, adult poets and young writers who work in youth slam and spoken word, shaking the dust.

‘Only’ Kids
Sometimes you remember that these young slam participants are still kids, and generally pretty new to this poetry lark. Someone makes a childish joke or a naïve comment, a casual sexist reference gets a giggle from friends, a performer forgets their lines or tries to walk off stage in the wrong direction. It’s these moments that make you realise just what they (and the adults/peer mentors who work with them) have achieved. The stumbled lines highlight how polished those choreographed, on-stage performances are. The kid practicing gang signs brings home how close to the bone and worldly-wise some of that poetry really is. The casual insult (I heard one young poet call another a paedophile) makes the many displays of love, support and mutual respect all the more remarkable. It’s easy to forget all of this when you’re being carried along by the youth slam wave.

When Artistic Director Jacob Sam-La Rose spoke to a room of a hundred plus young poets, poet coaches, shadow artists, teachers, peer mentors and general hangers on before the slam final, he had our (almost) undivided attention. This didn’t seem at all strange to me, until a couple of young slammers began whispering amongst themselves. A word from Jacob brought them back in line, but only then did I realise how remarkable it was that a packed room of hyped up young people were being so attentive to this lone man at the front of the room.

Jacob is a motivational speaker, to be sure, but I can’t help but think that something else was at work here too. This weekend was the culmination of months of work for those present and the event they were about to perform in was the cusp of this – their chance to shine after a whirlwind weekend of workshops and superstar poetry showcases. Once again, I was in the presence of converts to the spoken word mission.

For few months I have had the pleasure of working on a project called Shake The Dust which is a poetry slam initiative. I was working with the Manchester Old Trafford Young Identity Branch led by Poet and MC Frisko (Ali Gadema) http://www.shakethedust.co.uk/shaker/teams/north-west/

He’s probably one of the most passionate men I have met in my entire life. I have always been into lyrics and how some are used in songs and others are conveyed through the page or through spoken word. I was surprised how much this event touched me. Each region from the North West to the South East was represented by a school or youth group. It took place in London at Southbank Centre. You would think it would be competitive, but everyone was just happy to be a part of this event – as was I.

Some of these young people had never been to London and this was a moment they got to say what is on their mind in front of 900 plus people.

The strap line for this event was ‘The points are no the point, the point is the poetry’.

For me this is real power. A revolution is brewing and we should take heed of all expression as poetics are very important in music. I feel blessed to be a part of it and I look forward to more of the same. I saw some great poets who have changed my life within an instant and that is not easy from a sceptic such as myself: yet as I live and breathe it is so.

Another highlight of the weekend was meeting and watching First Wave perform – these guys are doing some great things in The States. Check out the link http://omai.wisc.edu/. Empowering stuff right there!

There was a real sense of community that everyone: from poet coaches, shadows, and the young people involved mixing so well with each other that many people forgot it was an actually competition.

Everyday there was something inspiring be it workshops, ciphers or just chilling out with someone from the poetry community.

The end of the show was perfectly signalled by the songs of Speech Debelle

Please check out these artists as they have changed everything for these young people as well as myself .

Kate Tempest http://katetempest.co.uk/audio

Saul Williams http://www.saulwilliams.com/

1. The Point is the Poetry

As the North West team pointed out on stage: Shake the Dust has not been about winning or losing: the point is not the point – the point is the poetry! The American poets who came over were impressed by the way Shake the Dust was run because it was so much about bonding over words and so little about battling. Even in the middle of the final I forgot it was a competition and found myself cheering and whooping for other teams than my own

2. Standing Ovations

When Kate Tempest ran off stage and out into the audience to do a poem I felt as excited as when seeing my favourite rock band at a festival. And to see a poet get standing ovations in a full Queen Elizabeth Hall is close to magic, no it is magic, no metaphor needed

3. Performance Skill Workshops

The poetry coaches and shadow artists ran workshops where the teams were mixed up and got a chance to get to know each other at the same time as improving their performance skills. I assisted my coach Mike Parker in a workshop where we got the young poets to practise their facial expressions. Can you guess what feeling they are acting out in the picture above?

4. Poetry Ciphers

I’d never heard the expression before but a poetry cipher is when a bunch of people gather in a circle in the street and anyone can get up and perform something whether it’s a song or a poem or anything else they want to share. This was happening all through the weekend at the Southbank and passers-by were stopping and joining in

5. The Birth of New Poems

To have one of my students running towards me with a flapping paper saying “I want to share a poem” in her most excited voice is so rewarding, something I hoped would happen by working with young people, having the poetry come from them with no force

6. Writing Workshops

I took part in one of the writing workshops run by American collective First Wave where the students collaborated to make a piece on the theme of superheroes. Making our own words mate with other people’s words is beautiful

7. New Friends

On the last morning it was a joy to watch the kids running around and swapping phone numbers and Twitter names with each other. Hugs and handshakes. Laughter and tears in equal measures

8. Networking

Not only the kids made new friends. I came home with a wad of business cards in my wallet. I don’t necessarily want to make business with all the other poetry coaches and shadows, but I do hope to keep in touch and share new ideas within the growing poetry community

9. Swearing in Italian

There were quite a few difficult issues that were brought up in the poems, in the work performed by adults as well as kids. Lively debates and thoughtful conversations were going on all over the place. I had an interesting discussion with one of the young poets what effect a swear word can have – is it self expression or just showing off? I don’t have an answer, but late at night a fellow poet taught me how to swear in Italian …

10. Poetry Brought me to London

Crossing the Thames by the footbridge a poet exclaimed: “I’d never thought that poetry would bring me to London!”. This was the case for a lot of people involved in Shake the Dust. Some of the young people had never been to London before and how many teenagers can say that they’ve been on stage in Queen Elizabeth Hall? Personally I felt the same. As a small-town Swedish girl I’d only dreamed of being involved in something as inspiring and fantastic as Shake the Dust

“This is not the end – it’s only the beginning!”  That’s what one of the young poets said when giving me a final high five.  So true. Let’s continue to Shake the Dust …!

This is all from me for this time. Thank you for reading. And a big thank you to everyone who made this happen.

After yesterday’s marvellous on point digital coverage from Dan Simpson at Shake the Dust, I was excited and apprehensive to see the project as it nears it’s conclusion in terms of the National Shake the Dust Weekend at the Southbank Centre.

Today is the second day of the three-day extravaganza and it has kicked off with the same aplomb and gusto that Dan talked about yesterday. After the first workshop and the opening address and I’m already smiling and it has inspired me way more than first thought.

I also had the real pleasure of talking and having a short interview with one of the National Judges for the Slam Final, Stephen Murray. He’s such a passionate man about Shake the Dust and slam poetry in general especially as this one involves young people. The link for the interview is here – http://soundcloud.com/shakethedustslam/stephen-murray-chats-about-the

All three rounds of workshops have allowed the new young generation of poets to find their own voice and are equipping them with the right tools, tips and exercises to bring the performance and confidence elements to their poetry when performed on stage. I was blessed with going to Michael Parker’s workshop on the power and contrast of poetry. It was thoroughly engaging as he taught the kids about the importance of silence, voice projection, stage presence and actioning your words. Very enjoyable to watch! I was also lucky to catch a glimpse of an energetic movement and focus-based workshop by First Wave’s Danez Smith. The kids were in awe and enjoyed learning more about these skills and their craft as well as the fun workshop games.

The evening kicked off in spectacular fashion with 100% Proof which featured performances from the Poet Coaches such as Kat Francois, Sai Murray, Brenda Read-Brown, Michelle Hubbard, Alfie Crow, Frisko, and Molly Naylor. The audience supported each act with respect and appreciation. Fingers clicked and woops were vocalised to enhance this. This only intensified when First Wave performed an excerpt of their play Shock and even more when headline act Lemn Sissay took to the stage. This event was full of energy and the audience were left inspired. A great event.

The next and last event of the night was the brilliant Friday Phonic organised and run by Southbank’s Young Producers and featured various performances from the Young Producers, Dean Atta, Marques Tolliver, and the headline act Dizraeli and the Small Gods. A wonderfully appreciative packed out crowd attended the gig and were not left disappointed with all acts performing to the fullest of their abilities. Dizraeli and the Small Gods gave a masterclass in the spoken word music hybrid. They have to be seen to be believed.

This day has truly enhanced my love for Shake the Dust!

“Shake the Dust is the biggest National Youth Slam ever attempted!

So far we have had workshops, we have had some unbelievable performances all over the country at the Regional Finals and now it’s time to take all that energy and talent to another level as we celebrate the National Shake the Dust Weekend which kicks off today at The Southbank Centre, London!

Working a lot on the digital campaign for Shake the amount of positive feedback has been astounding! This project has changed the lives of thousands, inspired minds of all ages and given the opportunity for a shed load of young people to get their voices heard through spoken word….just wow.

Thank you for following this amazing project and hope to bump into you at the final!

NATIONAL SHAKE THE DUST WEEKEND Thursday 5 – Saturday 7 July @ Southbank Centre http://ticketing.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/literature-spoken-word/tickets/the-national-shake-the-dust-slam-final-66644

THIS. IS. SHAKE THE DUST!!”

Cya at the final!

Click here to view the embedded video.

“As a kid ambition can be anything, everybody would try and strive to be the professional footballer or a famous dancer. In fact I remember saying to my Mum at the age of 8 that I would buy her a whole row of houses when I started playing for England.

As you grow up it’s important to hold on to what you wanted to become or get as close to it as you can. When I was 17 the culmination of bad grades and a difficult year at home meant that I started to lose all confidence in myself. I stopped playing football and stopped caring about a lot of things that I should have.

I realised that I couldn’t let my family down, they’d tried to help me every way they could. As the end of my sixth form year I was sat in my bedroom at home realising that I had probably failed most of my exams.  That evening I heard a song called ‘Liquid Diction’ by an artist by Jehst that gave me a new perspective on what I wanted to do. The lyrics made me step back and evaluate what I was doing, it gave me space to think clearly through the flow, word play and the beat…

‘I might not succeed but it’s instinctive to try, to see my goals achieved before I die. And if my flow runs dry, I’ll rehydrate to dilate’

A few months later I got my first 35mm analogue camera, I’ve been shooting ever since. It has led me to having my work shown on the BBC as well as starting up a production company. Projects like Shake the Dust are so important to young people for the same reason, words can change and influence our aspirations and I have never looked back since”

The Shake the Dust regional final occurred this Friday. It was an electric, inspiring night; brimming with fresh, raw talent provided by the next generation of poets. Those poets spoke their hearts. Let rip from their depths and left us all open mouthed and eager for more.

Myself and Lucy Lepchani had the honour of mentoring eight young pupils from Sir John Hunt; Stephen, Rhaya, Conner, Alisha, Georgi. Jade, Kennedy and Luke. Hade the honour of seeing them grow and bloom alongside each other. Had the honor of watching their awkwardness turn into confidence, their school books into works of art, their words into bullets.

Sir John Hunt gathered the award for the most courageous writing. The pupils  took risks on stage, unafraid and unashamed and the gold trophy proved that. Apart from the incredible highest scoring team, Tor Bridge High who are now heading to the nationals, Brook Green moved me so deeply, with humility and honesty in their performances and words. Stoke Dameral were so dynamic and inspiring,  Voices For Change were indeed the voices that spoke for us all, high, mighty and powerful.

When those pupils choose to express themselves rather then allow their insecurities to inhibit them. When they told us all how being fourteen felt they won. When they shared their fragility, their honesty and themselves, on a dimly lit stage in Plymouth. They became poets, every single one of them.

The National final is fast approaching, and it’s going to be massive!

NATIONAL SHAKE THE DUST WEEKEND Thursday 5 – Saturday 7 July @ Southbank Centre