Alvin Lauhttp://www.myspace.com/alvinlauAlvin Lau is a writer of poetry and prose. An avid competitor, he is a two-time Chicago youth poetry slam champion, two-time national youth poetry slam champion, the Grand Slam Champion of both the Mental Graffiti poetry slam and the Green Mill Poetry Slam, the Midwest regional poetry slam champion, a three-time individual finalist at the National Poetry Slam and Individual World Poetry Slam, and he is currently ranked #2 in the nation individually. He has been featured on the Amnesty International's Spoken Word Tour, HBO's Def Poetry Jam, and dozens of universities and slam venues across the country. He believes that all his success stems from having incredible teachers when he was part of the Young Chicago Authors writing program. Currently, he is working on a new chapbook, his first official CD release, and a planning a college tour with the poet-run talent agency Layman's Lyric. Favorites include red hair, Tequila, and Kanye West.In this article, Alvin Lau discusses the mindset needed in order to "slam to win." http://www.gotpoetry.com/News/article/sid=7065.htmlIntroduction
When I was first approached to write material about poetry slam strategy, I hesitated at the request -- not because my knowledge of the subject was particularly shallow -- but because I wondered how such a guide would be received. Winning has been a taboo subject for many poets, who feel that any discussion of competition goes against the spirit of poetry, ignoring the fact that a slam's greatest draw is it's competitive nature. They will argue that slam is the celebration of a community's mutual love of poetry, and that any talk of points or strategy does a disservice to artistry itself. They will be quick to acknowledge the famous quote of the now canonized Allen Wolf, “The points are not the point, the point is the poetry.”
Yes. Slam is a gimmick. Designed to give audiences an active role at readings, it is also the most successful tool to fill seats since beer. Year after year, the National Poetry Slam grows at an alarming rate, and expansion of the already week-long festival shows no signs of slowing. Despite its (often academic) detractors, the slam movement has grown in popularity every year without exception, branching to other continents, gaining corporate attention, and spawning two mainstream television showcases. Instead of having to rely on academia for work, poets can now be full-time, upper-middle class touring artists earning between fifty and a hundred-thousand dollars a year. Surely, this is the beginning of a golden age for performance poetry.
But in many poets' minds, "reading poetry" and "slamming to win" are mutually exclusive concepts. When they picture "slam poets," they envision gesticulative monologists who can't tell the difference between a metaphor and a tub of buttered popcorn. Pandering is the name of the game, and sophisticated, well-crafted work is a myth. Lyricism is a long lost art. Simply put, “slam poets” take the poetry out of a poetry reading.
But this misconception could not be further from the truth. While liberal, political ranting may win over local slam crowds, the highest levels of slam are dominated by emotional catharsis, image-dense narrative, and awe-striking, stylized execution. The most successful competitors are often successful artists outside of the slam arena: many have degrees in poetry or creative writing, teach at high schools and colleges, or are published in major literary journals. Within the past four years, at least three prominent names from the slam community have been published in the Best American Poetry series, an honor bestowed on only a handful of the country's finest literati every year.
This column will not be for everyone. Some people have no desire to win poetry slams and even look down at people who want to. If you are one of these people, reading on will be an exercise in boredom and disgust. But if you're a burgeoning writer looking for a little more exposure, or a veteran who needs polish in order to climb to the next tier, or even a hobbyist who loves going to the Green Mill every Sunday, this series will be for you.
Understanding the Rules
" There’s no weaseling out of defeat by redefining what the game is. The game should need no redefining, and a loss is a loss.”
- David Sirlin
A poetry slam is an Olympics-style poetry competition where performers are given three minutes to read a poem without props, costumes, or musical accompaniment. A panel of judges, randomly selected from the audience, score the poets between 0 and 10, using one decimal point to discourage ties. The highest and lowest scores are dropped, and the remaining scores are added together. The poet with the highest score at the end of the competition wins. Simple enough, right?
For many people, it's not. While the time limit and a microphone should be your only limitations, many poets approach slam with a set of self-imposed rules which hinder their competitive ability. Some purposefully confine themselves to a genre because they've had previous success with it. Some refuse to write poems because a subject is overdone; poets often look down on poems that mock the president or are political at all, seemingly on the basis that political work is common at slams. Other poets refuse to employ less-lyrical styles -- I've heard some very impressive, high-scoring-but-colloquial group pieces labeled “after school specials” by defeated rivals, who felt the simple delivery was nothing more than a dramatic PSA!
Before you can slam to win, you need to break down the mental constructs of “honor” and “artistry,” and focus on the singular goal at hand: getting more points than any other poet. In slam, there are no points for difficulty. No one is standing next to the judges with a ticker, adding bonus points every time you land a perfect iambic couplet. Sestinas do not score higher than free verse. While elitism and judgment can be fun – and competitive environments do foster these elements – you need to recognize when you are giving realistic assessments of other poets' work and when you are hurting your own winning chances by refusing an advantage. If extroverted, political work is scoring well at an invitational with $2000 on the line, you'd be a fool to limit yourself to quiet, depressing poems!
But let's be clear. I am not recommending dumbing down your work to be more accessible, to be entertaining rather than solemn, or to purposefully debase your art for the lowest common denominator. While taking these steps are easy and might give you short-term, local success, you will neither earn the respect of your peers or win points from stiff judges. Against talented opponents with finely-tuned styles, you'll be outright gutted. Shortcuts will not yield long-term success, hard work and originality will.
In future installments of this column, you'll see that I recommend a focus on craft, and pairing strong writing with solid, technical performances. While slam strategy will also be a featured topic, I need to first explain what it's for: slam strategy is only designed the maximize the score of a given poem by placing it well in a slam. If a poem is poor to begin with, strategy will be of no avail – it is rare that a particularly poorly written poem will beat an obviously well-written poem simply by going after it!
Why Should I Slam to Win?
Let's start with the idealistic reason and move onto the less popular, though more pragmatic one. Like any competitive game, poetry slams are a decent measure of skill and progress. If you consistently perform better against tougher and tougher competition, it is safe to say you are improving. While we all are taught to believe that any given poet can win on any given night, this is simply untrue: it's not a mere coincidence that the same six or seven names make it to the finals at national competitions. A handful of poets are capable of winning the majority of slams they compete in. If you are starting out and are seldom advance from round, suddenly make a breakthrough, then the next day you are winning on a consistent basis, obviously you are doing something right! Of course, it might not be your writing that's improving, but that's for another column...
Then the controversial reasons: money, glory, fame. Performance poetry and spoken word has only recently broken into the mainstream and already it's a financially viable career. Though touring slam venues, which are mostly composed of dark bars and small cafes, is very unprofitable, the corporate and college circuits are incredibly lucrative. It's not uncommon for a poet who is only famous in the slam community to average between $1500 and $2500 per show. Some public universities have been known to pay upward of $4000, and major corporations have paid upwards of $40,000 for ten minutes of poetry. Radio and TV producers have also recently turned to slam poets for adverts for Miller Light, Big Ten College basketball, and cell phones. Prominent hip-hop artist Lupe Fiasco recruited a former youth champion for spoken word spots on both of his most recent albums. A national champion was the supporting actor in the TNT series Saved. Slams are the gateway to all of these opportunities. Of course, yet-to-be-discovered musicians and actors have used slam as a stepping stone to bigger and better things, which has inspired resentment in the community, but you cannot take away the hard work and effort that went into their abilities in order to take advantage of the position slam afforded them. Baristas, bartenders, and other blue collars works have gone from minimum wage to BMWs with slam. It's kind of a big deal.
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