Not sure if this is the right section to post this, but it doesn't seem to fit anywhere else.

Have been thinking lately about giving poetry readings..I've joined the Poetry Soc and a couple of us have discussed the idea of going to one of their Open Mic sessions at the Poetry Cafe.
Problem: I have never performed publically in my life! Would be really grateful for feedback from anyone who has done it as to what sort of "preparation" (training?) you did ..drama lessons? public speaking course? learnt voice projection skills etc...
All I can think of to do is go for Dutch Courage, which I'm sure wouldn't help..(better to get the audience smashed.. )

Any advice/opinions gladly received!

x
tc

Hi tc.

I don't have much experience in this area, but the one time I did a reading in public what was useful to me was to have a couple of glasses of wine straight *after* the performance. After that I felt fine about it.

I have come to be of the opinion that if you want to do it - go for it. I used to never speak out about what I wanted, would never put my name down for something unless I had someone else interested. Sod that! Live life now. If it goes well - great, you'll do it again. If it doesn't - so what? People have short memories for other people's embarrasments (it's their own that they never forget) and it will give you experience and that should stand you in good stead to do it again anyway.

I say go for it. If you don't, you'll never know how it went.

My but you're brave!

I've heard that singing lessons can help develop voice projection.

Dee
x

Brave? Nah, not really. And life gets in the way of the theory - sometimes you just can't do it for whatever reason - work, kids etc all make their own demands.

Singing lessons - I would love to have some, if only just to ease the pressure on the hubby's ears (I am always singing, but it is one of only two things that my mum gives me a hard time about....)

Tinyclanger, I can only say from my experience in acting and as ten years as a stand up comic, don' try Dutch courage. It might go all right on the night due to luck and a lot of support but you won't remember what you did right or believe you actually did it. Just try some simple breathing techiniques, relax yourself and make sure you know what you're saying and what sort of reaction you'rehooping for. Practice with the mike if there is one, and aim for slight eye contact then look up just below the lights and aim your poem there. The audience will think you'e looking directly at them and be drawn to you. I hope this is helpful, it has been a while since I've been on stage, but some things you don't forget.

Best

Julie

Tinyclanger, our resident poetic expert James Graham has quite a bit of experience of this- as has John Mole, other poetry Site Expert- why not WW mail them for some thoughts? also, funnily enough, we are about to interview a performance poet...

Okay, here's my two cents (pennies - we're in the UK you know!) worth.

I've done a couple of presentations to about forty strangers all eyeballing me and all I can say about it is that it's damned nerve shattering the first few minutes (no matter how much you've practiced) but then you get into the flow of it and end up wishing it didn't end so quickly!

Advice...practice, practice, practice (with a mic if possible) otherwise practice reading loudly but without sounding like you're shouting (incase the mic conks out).

Wear something that you're comfortable in and that you like so you're not worrying about what people think of your shoes or low v-neck top .

DON'T have a drink before you go on - because that could have the opposite affect on your nerves.

Remember to breathe while you speak - this may sound like an odd thing to say but you'd be surprised how nerves make you want to say everything in one breath until you're red in the face and your voice is like a squeaking balloon.

When you're practicing read slower than you normally would because when you're nervous you will automatically speed it up a notch - be aware of the speed you're reading at when you're on the stage - force yourself to take a breath and slow down.

Force yourself to look out into the audience and not glue your eyes to the paper you're reading from.

Smile!

I think that's all...except for lastly and but not leastly (I know it's not a word) - be confident. If you exude confidence - others will have confidence in you. To quote my good friend Wills "Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt." Go for it, sista!

Good luck with it TC - I'm sure you'll be great and it will be a wonderful experience.

Nahed

Dear Tinyclanger - good for you. Bringing your poetry to an audience is a fun thing and teaches you a lot about how you write. The poetry cafe is a fantastic venue - very informal and relaxed and anyone can have a go - I believe in the open mic sessions there (unless they've changed it), you only get to do one poem per person, unless you're the "draw of the evening" so my main advice is to enjoy it, forget yourself and let the words do the work. The fantastic thing about the society performance sessions is anyone can take part and you might be mixing with the great and the good as well - my good friend, Angela, performed a selection from her first collection alongside Neil Rollinson!!!! And everyone enjoyed the evening.

As for my own experience, I've performed several times with my poetry group in our local and not so local bookshops, and the thrill you get from performance and seeing an audience react is something out of this world. I also took part in Guildford Book Festival's poetry slam which was a laugh a minute and I'd definitely do one again - for that, you absolutely need a glass in one hand and some chutzpah in the other!!

This Thursday, I'll be doing it all over again at my launch party for "Tidal", so I suspect that once you've got the buzz in your blood, you won't be able to let go!

Some tips which always help: take everything at a slower pace than you normally would, as people always speak faster than they think they do. Practise with the work several times beforehand but NOT on the day - this will give it freshness. If it helps (and I find it useful) mark up with a pencil on your reading copy those places where you need to pause or (in my case, vital!!) where you need to take special care over conjunctions of words which might make you stammer (Ps and Ss for me!!). But if you do make a slight fluff on the night, just say the word/line again and carry on - the audience isn't your enemy. They will forgive you. At one of our group readings, one of my friends got to the end of a piece, realised she'd left out the last 5 lines, apologised, scrabbled in her bag for another (correct) copy, and then read it again - nobody minded and everyone enjoyed the work.

But most important of all, let the poem live and be the most important thing and everything else will follow. Have a great time!

Lots of love

Anne B

Gosh, thanks everyone! Lots of great sounding advice, so I am going to take a while and read through it all several times to let it sink in properly.
Anna, I will certainly contact James and John for some expert tips, thanks. (By the way, a while ago I took some of the kids at my school to hear a performance by 'Skorpio the Nemesis', who was absolutely superb.
Fabulous rap/beat poetry with such positive 'messages' - and boy can he perform! Might be worth an interview sometime if you can track him down.)

I feel like this is something I need to do if I am serious about my poetry. I know its virtually impossible to get published - I haven't even got enough poems to send a collection out to publishers yet,
and even if I DID one day get a deal, I don't suppose I'd make much money! So I figured this would be a way of raising a profile, and maybe it will lead somewhere. I might even enjoy it!! I believe in what I write,
would be great to think others enjoyed hearing some of it, (though maybe I need to write some more cheerful stuff, not many laughs for an audience right now!)

The Poetry Cafe sounds like a good place to start, I'd hope they were all at least ready to give a novice a break - when I mentioned it to colleagues at work there was talk of raising a posse to make sure I had at least some backing!
I'm also moving at the end of the week and know there's a writer's group in my new area, so I'll join that and maybe they do 'public' things which would give me some confidence.
Funny, I can speak to a class full of kids without thinking twice about it, and have even doen a bit in Assemblies of 200, but the idea of doing this feels very alien and scary to me. I suppose its something about 'putting your soul' on view
that makes it different. I would care desperately about how it went, and that's what makes it so daunting!

But thanks again folks..any more thoughts, I'm still listening! And when I take the plunge, you'll be the first to know!

x
tc

Hi Tinyclanger,

Some great pieces of advice already offered, and I don’t know if I can add anything new, but I’m passionate about aspects of performance, particularly anxiety, having run the gauntlet myself for many years, and facilitated workshops about nerves and suchlike. Having performed as an actor, StoryActor, perf.poet (my own stuff and that of others) etc., etc., for a good long while now, I still remember the days of sweaty palms, palsied papers, shaking and tremulous voice. True, acting training helped, but there are other factors that may be of use. I hope what follows isn’t teaching granny to suck eggs, or blindingly obvious… I guess some of it doesn’t apply directly to you, Tc, but I offer it as general suggestions…

Performance of any kind is personal to every individual, and each one of us has to find our own ‘voice’. Initial attempts at technique training can be met by resistance because it may feel like it’s demanding change of the whole person, the deep-down ‘you-ness’ of you.

Practice, yes. Find a poem, or piece of work you really like (by someone else, so you don’t feel a great burden of responsibility and nakedness) read it aloud. To yourself, to anyone who’ll listen. Play with it. Take the mickey, sing it, do it badly, do it in a funny or different accent, do it as a famous impressionist. Exaggerate, go right over the top, shout it, whisper it, ham it up, act it out, ensure it makes the least sense possible. Do anything that liberates it (and yourself) from portentousness, preciousness and importance. Then have a bash at making sense of it.

Then try it with some of your own work.

Read stories to children, if you’ve access to them (re-reading your posting, I see you already have), or a trusted friend (who offers no comment, no ego), a situation where you feel safe and you’ve nothing to lose, where you’re simply sharing with someone. Tell the story; communicate. See how that makes you feel. It’s great. Or maybe go to out-of-the way places, where nobody knows you, where it’s not important – that word again. Like a Performance Commando, slip on, do your bit, slip off.

Don’t make it too important. Don’t get hung up on technique, on whether you’re dropping off at the ends of sentences, etc.
All this (too soon) can make the self-consciousness worse, until you’ve assimilated it all with repetition and experience, and the realisation that you let all the intellectual stuff, the mental stuff go, and you’re able to let go of your internal monitor, but that usually comes later. If you understand what you’re trying to say, the truth will come across.

If it helps, by all means mark the script, for pauses, breathing, whatever, but try to assimilate all that, beforehand, so it becomes second nature - let it go and let it flow. Perhaps, if you’re reading pieces, instead of just having flimsy bits of paper that may tremble, or mysteriously end up in the wrong order, put your work in a sturdy folder with transparencies, or even a clipboard – something hard to cradle, if you need it.

All vocal training, exercises etc., can help, but the most important thing to remember at first, is that if you want to communicate, you will. As long as you allow the passion and commitment of the work to come through, it’ll come off.

It’s so easy to worry about formulae and technique (it’ll come, with experience, and, if you want, with training). “What do I do with my hands?” is a worry of amateur and some professional actors, and singers, and even guitarists (!) I’ve known. I said the same thing myself, years ago. But once you truly know what you’re saying, fully, why you’re performing, and that you’re honestly giving out the piece, doing the work justice (which it fully deserves) and being genuine and sincere, you can’t lose. You stop dwelling on peripherals (it’s just insecurity, and human). And you forget about your hands, feet, stance – whatever. It may sound twee, and possibly pretentious, but I always stress that I never perform AT an audience, nor even TO them, but WITH them. By that I mean that, really, most people want you to succeed, they want to share – even if they won’t admit it. And the performer wants to share his/her work. We offer it up with vulnerability and carefully gained courage and confidence. Like a relationship with a loved one, we should be as genuine as we can be, and as trusting as we can be, but remember, after the performance, we never have to see the audience again, if we don’t want to.

Remember too, you’re not baring your soul, even though it maybe feels like it. Concentrate on the work, not the one doing the delivery. (The song, not the singer.)
If you’ve tried reading to kids, or anyone who really wants to hear the story, you’ll notice that they aren’t studying, criticising, judging you, the teller; they want to know what happens. I believe most people are like that, deep down.

And finally, just keep doing it. Once you realise the earth hasn’t swallowed you up, and you’re not dead, you’ll probably love it.

We are but children as we strut and strive for grace
Dreamers of Beauty – deafen us with the tempest of your lifted hands
Let me awaken as the child of our communion
And sleep with the smile of someone loved upon my face.

( And even if you don't, I'm still gonna have a bash )

Hope this is of some use.

All the best and great luck

Pete

Wow! Pete thank you so, so much!
Can't tell you - and everyone else - how grateful I am for the time you have taken with responding, I feel I have to have a go now, or I'll be letting you down!

Ok. Get the message loud and clear about making a start on my own and getting used to it, beginning to feel it, play about, and see that I can do it..I'll begin that next time I have the house to myself. It will obviously take time to become comfortable, but the soner I start, the sooner I'll be finding myself up there..
Im actually quite looking forward to performing to myself now, just hope I can extend that a bit in time.

Thanks again. This is obviously going to be a 'work in progress' so I'll update everyone as to how I'm progressing.

x
tc

TC -

If you like you can have my kids to read/perform to. Just tell me about two weeks in advance - I might still be able to get a good last minute deal on a holiday for one (me) and then they're all yours!

Yours harrassed,

Nahed

Subjecting your kiddies to listening to ME at the moment....fate worse than, and all that.
Can't believe you're THAT harrassed, Wordy.
But then again, I don't have any kids..spend all day surrounded by 1200 of the little blighters, tho'!
Wonder if those last two statements are linked in any way

x
tc

tc -

I admire teachers...I wouldn't last a day being surrounded by other people's children...I barely tolerate my own (I love them really). I have to lie down now...that's a really terrifying thought.


N x

I do like children....couldn't manage a whole one though....