Marc Kelly Smith
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Marc Kelly Smith (born 1949) is an American
poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...
and founder of the
poetry slam A poetry slam is a competitive art event in which poets perform spoken word, spoken word poetry before a live audience and a panel of judges. Poetry slams began in Chicago in the 1980s, with the first slam competition designed to move poetry rec ...
movement, for which he received the nickname Slam Papi. Smith was born in 1949 and grew up on the southeast side of
Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...
. He attended/graduated Charles P. Caldwell Elementary School and James H. Bowen High School. Smith spent most of his young life as a construction worker, but has written poetry since he was 19.


Uptown Poetry Slam

Smith started at an
open mic An open mic or open mike (shortened from "open microphone") is a live show at a venue such as a coffeehouse, nightclub, comedy club, strip club, or pub, often taking place at night (an open mic night), in which audience members may perform on ...
night at the Get Me High lounge in November 1984 called the Monday Night Poetry Reading. Even as poets scoffed at artists "performing" their work, rather than gently "reading" it, the event grew in popularity. Smith saw his approach as an " up yours" to establishment poets he considered snooty and effete, because at their events, "no one was listening". According to Smith, who once attended a conventional reading with his manuscripts concealed inside a newspaper, With a like-minded troupe, Smith hosted the first poetry slam at the Get Me High Lounge in the Bucktown neighborhood in 1986. The event soon migrated to the Green Mill, a tavern and jazz lounge in Chicago's Uptown neighborhood, where it has remained ever since. Other poets in the first slam were Mike Barrett, Rob Van Tuyle, Jean Howard, Anna Brown, Karen Nystrom, Dave Cooper, and John Sheehan, all fellow members of the Chicago Poetry Ensemble. According to Smith, the first slam was more
variety show Variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is entertainment made up of a variety of acts including musical performances, sketch comedy, magic, acrobatics, juggling, and ventriloquism. It is normally introduced by a compĂ ...
than competition. Though all slams vary in format, Smith is considered responsible for key features, including the selection of judges from the audience and cash prizes. As stated in the PBS television series, ''The United States of Poetry'', a "strand of new poetry began at Chicago's Green Mill Tavern in 1987 when Marc Smith found a home for the Poetry Slam." Smith had found a crowd-inclusive, entertaining method for nurturing the poetry scene. Since then, the poetry slam has spread throughout the world, exported to over 500 cities large and small. In the book, ''Words in Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam'', author Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz describes the influential Smith: Since July 1986, Smith has run the Uptown Poetry Slam, a three-hour show featuring an open mic (1 hour), feature—poet or professional touring act (1 hour), and the poetry slam. It is the longest-running, weekly poetry show in the country, and one of the longest-running shows in Chicago history. In 1990, the first
National Poetry Slam The National Poetry Slam (NPS) was a performance poetry competition where teams from across the United States, Canada, and, occasionally, Europe and Australia, participate in a large-scale poetry slam. The event occurred in early August every y ...
was held in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
(with three city teams attending including Chicago and
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
), and has continued to rotate among cities. The National Poetry Slam currently sees over 80 teams of poets vying for the title. Over the years, Smith has turned down offers to
commercialize Commerce is the organized system of activities, functions, procedures and institutions that directly or indirectly contribute to the smooth, unhindered large-scale exchange (distribution through transactional processes) of goods, services, and ...
the slam, including movie offers and bids for corporate sponsorship. Smith says that what he considers to be Slam's increased commercial exploitation, and
Def Poetry Jam ''Russell Simmons presents Def Poetry'', better known as simply ''Def Poetry Jam'' or ''Def Poetry'', was a spoken word poetry television series hosted by Mos Def and airing on HBO between 2002 and 2007. The series features performances by estab ...
in particular, as having "diminished the value and aesthetic of performance poetry." This, combined with a continuing lack of Slam's recognition by "big literature festivals and institutions" in America, has led Smith to become more invested in performance poetry in Europe, where he says the "audiences are growing over there. And the aesthetic is growing and evolving." Smith has published several books about the poetry slam movement, as well as publishing two books of his own work. He tours extensively, performing his own, blue-collar, Carl Sandburg-influenced poetry and hosting poetry slams. He also tours with a show titled ''Sandburg to Smith-Smith to Sandburg,'' which combines the work of both poets with live jazz.Aptowicz, Cristin O'Keefe. (2008). ''Words in Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam.''
Soft Skull Press Counterpoint LLC was a publishing company that Perseus Books Group launched in 2007. It was formed from the consolidation of three presses: Perseus' Counterpoint Press, Shoemaker & Hoard, and Soft Skull Press. The company published books under b ...
. "Chapter Five: Marc Smith (So What!); The Truth about Who Invented the Poetry Slam" Page 38. .
With Mark Eleveld, he has developed a podcast, "Thru the Mill with Marc Kelly Smith".


Bibliography

*''By Someone's Good Grace'', CD 1993, Publisher Splinter Group Chicago *''Crowdpleaser'', 1996, Publisher Jeff Helgeson *''The Spoken Word Revolution'', 2003, Publisher Sourcebooks Publishing, advisor to the book/narrator of CD portion *''The Complete Idiot's Guide to Slam Poetry'', 2004, Penguin/Alpha Press (co-written with Joe Kraynak) *''The Spoken Word Revolution Redux'', 2006, Publisher Sourcebooks Publishing, narrator of CD portion *''Quarters in the Jukebox'', CD, 2006, Publisher EM Press (www.em-press.com), live and studio tracks, with bands and solo *


Filmography

*
SlamNation ''SlamNation'' is a 1998 documentary film by director Paul Devlin. The film follows the National Poetry Slam in Portland, Oregon. It follows the 1996 Nuyorican Poetry Slam team (Saul Williams, Beau Sia, muMs da Schemer and Jessica Care Moore ...
- 1998, directed by Paul Devlin *Sunday Night Poets - 2002, directed by David Rorie, Pugi Films distributed by National Film Network https://www.directedbydavid.com/portraits
Histoire de dires
- 2008, documentary directed by Yann Francès & Matthieu Chevallier - produced by Vivement lundi !


References


External links


Personal home pageslampapi.comAudio of "Money," "El Train Medley" and "In Clifton" from the Indiefeed Performance Poetry Channel"Thru the Mill with Marc Kelly Smith"
podcast, with interviews by Mark Eleveld. {{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Marc American male poets Slam poets Place of birth missing (living people) Poets from Chicago 1949 births Living people