Acoustic Night

42nd Acoustic Night at Halo, part of Bristol Poetry Festival and featuring the Instant Anthology. A night of mostly poetry with wool, a Cello and even some physical theatre thrown in…

This blog is dedicated to Catharine Stott. She might nit knots but she’s not a nit.

Ali Wade as MC unhinged us with ee cummings by way of an opening poem and then set about getting everyone on stage in good order and good spirits.

ALI WADE

First up was a welcome return from Poetry Jack, PJ Duncan all the way from Co. Durham. It was great to see her back in Halo and she served us a scrummy virtual birthday cake. A poetry ‘cake with true grit … and no Hallmark sentimentality’. Lovely, heartfelt and no empty calories.

POETRY JACK

Next was Gary Death who dedicated his poem The Room to Andi and the rest of the Acoustic Night team. The poem celebrates Open Mic nights throughout the country where ‘there’s no reality TV’ where you can ‘enjoy every body’s mind, we are one of a kind’. We appreciated your appreciation of The Room, Gary.

GARY DEATH

Craig Wilson followed with his Glastonbury poem. Darkness to light with organic food thrown in and a fight between a wizard and a witch. Craig said this was not a typical poem of his but that he has been affected by Glastonbury in the way he writes … which I can believe very easily, it’s that kind of place.

Mark Walton was next with Amazing, billed as a relentlessly upbeat poem it featured all the amazing things Mark can do. I really enjoyed it, especially lines like ‘I can dance you inside out’. This poem got a bit steamy in places and also had some brilliant twists ‘I can change the way you see … damn it - I can change the way you look.’ Slightly chilling yet cheering at the same time - smart.

I’m always enthralled by Gina Briganti and her songpoemsongs. Lies of Love has been haunting me since I first heard it a while ago and it was great to hear it again. Gina makes heartache so beautiful - ‘goose bumps rise in dawn cooled eddies’ ‘when love walks by, remember not to die, in public’ AND she sings a great brass section. I love her voice and I love all the cool stuff she said about Ali, too.

GINA BRIGANTI

Guy Herbert got up next and I had my fingers crossed that he’d do Owed to a Kiss and yep, he did. Some of the steamy atmosphere Mark started was carried on in this poem that set pulses racing. Bodies get entwined and bliss ensues - it took us a while to catch our breaths afterwards. Read the poem in the anthology and you’ll see what I mean. Phew!

GUY HERBERT

Andi Langford Woods then performed ‘Where are the gods?’ her horror expressed at those who persecute, maim and kill a young woman for loving the ‘wrong’ person, all in the name of religion. Never one to shy from tough subjects, Andi nails this one with precision poetry.

Derrick Hines read two short poems that are both in the anthology, Crush and Pleaser. Both tightly written with stylish word play and imagery, they tell something of the human condition and our relationships with others and ourselves. Derrick, you are a proper poet, mate, just like those on stage at Arnolfini on Sunday night.

DERRICK HINES

Ash Dickenson (the thinking man’s Axel Rose) was next and I am sorry but I was laughing so hard I hardly made any notes. Ash’s imagination is slightly scary at times and he produced a poem about a coffee table (that doubles as a shopping trolley) made out of a taxidermied bride - a work of art, for life, due to be announced as the next winner of the Turner Prize. Ash told me has travelled to here there and everywhere and I’m just glad he’s washed up in Bristol for a while, though a bit gutted that I’ll be away for his one man show.

ASH DICKENSON

I was on next and the poem’s in the anthology. It’s sort of a story, sort of a love poem - you decide. Please forgive the dodgy Irish accent.

POLLY MOYER

Richard Lawson can’t write a bad poem. He’s a top poet and performer and I thought Jobbing Squaddie was a fine fine piece. This poem gives a chilling insight into the lives and times of the cannon fodder soldier. It takes us from the beginning when ‘If we went out for a piss they’d put their hands up’ to the grim horror of being spat on by those you are trying to save and ordered about by those that will be given medals while you get court martialled. There’s lots of fine pieces in the anthology - if you have not already got one, get it so that you can read this poem again and again.

RICHARD LAWSON

And the same goes for Hazel Hammond’s In Avatar. Hazel just gets better and better and performed this beautiful, calm and moving love poem which was certainly worthy of inclusion in any Poetry Festival. She links love to sights and tastes and sensations and then ‘the delight drains away…I’m sensible once more’ - she lets her love fly but stays grounded. I could listen to her all night.

Voices you can listen to, almost no matter what they are saying, gave the theme for David Johnson’s Villanelle (he says he’s been going through a villanelle spell of late). Making rhymes work well in a villanelle is tricky but David pulled it off and his mellifluous tones matched the subject perfectly…’honeyed tones…tumble words…like gold coins from a purse’. As with several other poets tonight I felt a bit sad to just be hearing one piece. Another proper job poet.

DAVID JOHNSON

Sarah Tamar then made us all laugh with her ’summer revisited’ poem about rain, rain and more rain; Noah Revisited. In the style of an old testament bible reading, this was a list of the horrors of the wet weather ‘everything is rank’ and St Swithin sends ‘monsoonicidal lightening strikes’, making children, cats, dogs and insurance companies very unhappy. No good can come of it and there’s ‘Not a Dove in Sight’. For once I feel quite glad that I’m moving to the desert soon.

SARAH TAMAR

Next up was Julian Ramsey-Wade with his take on Gil Scott-Heron’s classic, The Revolution will not be Televised. Julian’s version (swap Evolution for Revolution and you’ve got it) is very faithful to the original with the rhyme scheme and verse length and everything. Which just shows that writing in forms (such as sonnets or villanelles or following someone else’s format) - which might seem restrictive - can lead to brilliant work, full of great metaphors and messages. Julian’s performance is always energetic and inclusive and this acoustic night audience certainly appreciated his work. Ten, without a doubt, any slam, any time, any place. In my not very humble opinion.

JULIAN RAMSEY-WADE
At this point we all went off to make our anthologies and chat about how good the first half had been.

Ali welcomed us back with a poem unmarked by sensationalism featuring the use of ‘hammers instead of silk’ - one of Mark Patrick’s pieces. She then plugged a few gigs especially the stuff happening for Mental Health Week. And then, with great joy and anticipation, she introduced the Acoustic Night Special Guest….drum roll….

Lucy English. Lucy ‘dontcha wish your mama was hot like me? dontcha, dontcha?’ confessed to having been a poet for over a decade and took us on a journey of ‘my life through the power of poetry’ including the Slam years, the Love and Sex years, the I’m Bored Now bit and other selected highlights of her turbulant and frankly quite naughty past. This was a mix of poems covering hippy chick personal growth, Bristol beauty spots (Sea Walls, not the Phone Box on Ashley Hill), drunk sluts (crafty, evil, mad, drunk sluts at that) and, yes, underwear. It got very steamy in places (I knew I was going to get to write that yet again!) Lucy said what she has learnt from all this time writing and performing poetry is that what a girl really needs is a good sturdy pair of elasticated knickers and she finished with one of her latest poems to prove the point. Rumbunctuous, sexy, cool, clever - she delivered all of that and more. Audiences throughout the world love Lucy and the Acoustic Night crowd was no exception.

LUCY ENGLISH

By this stage my pencil was wearing out so there’s just a few notes from the second half….sorry….

Ian Sills took us through the perils and pitfalls of electronic love letters - funny, yet sad, yet funny…

IAN SILLS

Nicky David gave us more steamy stuff about falling in love with a Gigolo - good poem with a terrific ending.

NICKY DAVID

Stuart (acoustic night virgin) mimed getting up in the morning with assorted sound effects - very clever and very funny.

STUART

Josie didn’t know if she was doing singing or poetry and she didn’t care - we didn’t either cos it was fun and funky, whatever it was.

Pete Gioconda sang ‘My life’ which featured rockets going off and questioning ‘will the world end in apathy or violence?’ accompanied by mouth organ and guitar. Well worth a gander at the piece he put in the anthology, too. It’s dark… and good.

Caleb Parkin (acoustic night virgin) failed to film Peregrine Falcons but succeeded in writing a great piece called Cull (after Hitchcock) about the ubiquitous Seagull, which he performed with a Cello background. I could tell most people in the room found the hairs on the backs of their necks raised by this piece.

CALEB PARKIN

Peter Hunter made us laugh and cry in the same poem, writing about his mum having Cancer. I know he hates me saying this but he’s so so talented and not just as a poet. Bastard.

PETER HUNTER

Cathy Keal got steamy (I think that’s the last time I get to write steamy, bother.) with a poem which was an invitation to do something very naughty. She said it was a bit like her, rather rough!!

CATHY KEAL

George Wade made music for us all with his poem Angels. He always makes my thoughts chime and just being in the same room as George makes me happy. There’s often a message or few in his poetry as well as subtle imagery and beautiful rhythm.

GEORGE WADE

Marco sang a short and simple song that he said had been haunting him for a while. It went ‘Give me your heart, for a while’ - I think we did.

MARCO

Andi came back with a piece concerning the two sides to beauty, showing life metabolised through experience. A metaphysical poem with the word metaphysical in it. Talented and beautiful and kind, that’s our Andi.

ANDI and CATHERINE STOTT

Gina performed the end of a poem, a slice of a diary about the reality following the fantasy. She can make us laugh while breaking our hearts. Piercing.

Guy had another poem for us, My Mountain. A very visceral piece, philosophical too. Something about how he knows the answers to his questions before he asks them so should leave the gurus alone and stay away from matchbox aphorisms. Deep. Fine.

Derrick said he was in love with the entire Wade family and performed a poem called Yes about what happens when he falls back in love with humanity. No matter how many blows, he won’t hit back. Strong words, tightly woven.

Then me again with a poem (ish) about being face to facebook with reality. Now, this is spooky, Derrick just sent me a friend message, which arrived in my in tray just as I was writing his bit of this blog. Wooooooo.

At this point it feels important to mention that Catharine was knitting a blanket for her sister’s baby. She’s finished it now.

Sarah told us she used to be a social worker and performed a very moving piece from the point of view of someone under the chemical cosh … ‘you are trying to turn my voices against me…cloak me in invisibility’. Powerful, empathetic and profound.

Julian did Ink, one of my personal favourites, about connecting people via the power of writing and performing poetry. Upbeat, lovely. Just like Julian, really.

Ian made us laugh again with Refreshing, his guide to mature student life. A fine example of how age and experience don’t always get the better of us.

Stuart came back and mimed his morning again, but with a few variations. Things went wrong. More things went wrong. It was flippin’ hilarous and I am sorry if you missed it ‘cos you truly had to be there to get how funny it was.

Ali, heart of a lion, sang a song about the assumptions people make and what is and isn’t acceptable - and what we might decide to do about it. Fab job as MC, Ali, plus a few great performances thrown in.

Josie sang down the show, telling us we had been sublime. Great end to a great night.

OK, I just want to say that I have talked to a few people recently who said they found acoustic night a bit intimidating because it felt like everyone else there knew each other. So I just want to say that some of us do and the way we got to know each other was … yep, you guessed … through Acoustic Night. So please come back, say hello and do your stuff.

A big thanks to Polly Moyer for the review, we’ll miss her when she disappears to the States (again) but we know she will be back next year.

ACOUSTIC NIGHT STATS

Performers: 19
Audience: great!
Virgins: a couple
Mouth organs: one
Cellos: one
Instant Anthologies: beautiful, collectors’ items.