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‘Home at Last’: Interview in MSHALE MAGAZINE
photo by B Fresh Photography
Liberian-American Spoken-Word Artist is Home at Last
Justin Schell , Contributing Writer
“This is a year of completion for me,” e.g. bailey says in the office of Trú Rúts Endeavors, the multidisciplinary arts organization that he runs with his wife, Shá Cage.
His struggle to fit in America is not unlike that of many African immigrants. He attributes his success as an award-winning multidisciplinary artist and producer to this struggle of finding a home away from home.
bailey, who was born in Saclepea, Liberia, is the son of a white Peace Corps volunteer and a Liberian mother. His father, bailey says, “threw a dart, hit Liberia, and that’s where he got stationed.” His mother gave birth to him near the end of his father’s second term; and his parents lost touch after his father’s return to America.
Even as a child he loved music and theater: two memories stand out in particular from his life in Liberia.
“There was a record store and a movie theater,” he says. “I would spend hours in the record store listening to whatever they were playing.”
The owner of the mud-constructed movie theater, however, wasn’t particularly keen on offering free entertainment to they young movie revelers. “We would either sneak into the movie theater or we would drill holes in the side to watch the movie.” After the owner realized this, he would take blindingly-hot Liberian red peppers, soak them in water, and put the mixture in a spray bottle, and spray into the holes to temporarily prevent onlookers from watching the film without paying. “It would be this constant game of trying to outwit [him], as soon as you saw a shadow coming.”
One day, another Peace Corps volunteer came to his village and, after getting to know him, expressed interest in adopting him. Instead it was his father who ended up adopting the 10-year-old Bailey after she sought out his father through the Peace Corps database.
After landing in Chicago, he was driven to his new home in Crystal Lake, an hour-and-a-half from Chicago. There was a parade the day he arrived, with money thrown from the floats.
“I thought it was a parade for me!” he says with a laugh. “The next day, I wake up, I’m like ‘Ok, when are we going to the parade and when can we get more money?’ That was the start of my life in the US.”
Reality soon set in for bailey as he learned that life in America was not rosy for a new immigrant, “It was a struggle of trying to adapt and trying to fit in. Trying to figure out who I am and not fitting into any place, I always felt like I was running, that I couldn’t stop moving.”
Until he moved to Minneapolis, when he felt,“Ok, I can stop running now.”
bailey’s first connection to Minneapolis came not through the city itself, but through one of its most famous musicians. “I discovered Prince in [Crystal Lake’s] record store. I think it was “Little Red Corvette.” My ears just perked up, trying to find out who this person was, and I proceeded to get everything that he put out.”
After moving to Minneapolis, he started performing solo and with a number of music groups, and worked in the retail division of Prince’s famed Paisley Park complex, gaining crucial experience to navigate the shady mazes of the music industry when he formed Trú Rúts and its record label, Speakeasy Records.
He had a life-changing experience on a trip to the country of his birth after being gone for nearly 20 years. He returned to Liberia in 1999 as part of a four-month trip to Africa, the Middle East and East Asia. The trip, while crucial to his development as an artist as well as a person, was not what he expected.
“I realized that I could go back, but I could never live back home. I’d been away too long to be able to go back home and do what I’m supposed to do.”
An overwhelming and inane sense of homelessness hit him, he says, “going home displaces you. You’re no longer at home in either place. Home is what I had to create.”
Thus homelessness and travel inform all of bailey’s work, which symbolically channels his own experience through the larger histories of the African Diaspora. His album American African, scheduled for release in April, will appropriately feature a host of both American Africans and African Americans, including M.anifest, DJ Stage One, Mankwe Ndosi, IBé, and other international artists, including Germany’s Starsky and Dubai’s Abstract Collision.
“It’s a testament to where African Americans and American Africans are,” he says, encompassing the multitude of African, African American, and American African perspectives. “I want to avoid the idea of a monolithic Africa as much as possible.”
The first single off of American African, “America,” is a wide-ranging vision of the post-9/11 America that many immigrants find themselves in.
“America, I miss you,” bailey intones at its opening. He delivers his words atop a bed of rolling drums and cymbals, electric bass, disorienting electronic sounds, and wailing saxophone. From Katrina to Guantanamo, Hollywood to Baghdad, the poem subtly welds together the long histories of racism and murder that stain America’s past, yet without completely destroying the hope of something better. In the end, the music dies away as bailey softly, powerfully, declares “We’re waiting for your resurrection.”
bailey has an ambitious plan to release three more albums in 2009 that have been at various stages of completion throughout his work with Trú Rúts. Yet completion always breeds the start of something new, whether it be the release of new albums from other artists in the Tfamily such as Quilombolas, TruthMaze, or El Guante. Or the birth of his first child with his wife Shá Cage.
Even though e.g. bailey has settled in one place after a long journey, his creative activity and poetic journeys show no signs of slowing down.
e.g bailey has produced “No Longer at Ease” (play), an adaption from the Chinua Achebe’s novel for the Pangea World Theatre in May 2001; “Village Blues” (film); and “Words Will Heal the Wound”, a spoken word radio series celebrating the diverse poetic traditions in Minnesota.
He received the Sarah Lawrence College International Film Festival (2001) Experimental Film award for Village Blues; the NFCB (National Federation of Community Broadcasters) award for Write On RaDio!; and the Worldstaff Houston International Festival (1999) Experimental Film award for Village Blues.
Visit his website for a full listing of productions, performances and awards: www.myspace.com/egbailey or www.egbailey.com.
Tru Ruts presents Free download of E.G. Bailey’s ‘Oracles of Equiano (Starskie’s Pushing Mix)’
More than any other performance art, spoken-word is subject to stereotypes. Everyone knows that spoken-word is read only in dark clubs, only by beret-wearing neo-beatniks who rant and rave about the revolution with pre-programmed flows and unoriginal deliveries. Everyone knows that spoken-word can be austere and preachy or screamingly emphatic…but never funky.
Enter e.g. bailey. Over a fun, stuttering house beat produced by Germany’s Starskie, the Twin Cities poet and educator proves that you can indeed dance to spoken-word. The piece itself refers to Olaudah Equiano, a former slave whose autobiography became a major piece of the abolitionist struggle, and touches on the continuing struggle for justice, the importance of the arts and what “freedom” means in the age of Obama and beyond, for both African-Americans and Africans. It’s neither a typical club song nor a typical spoken-word track, but bailey has never been a typical artist.
The free download is available at these links: truruts.bandcamp.com
The original version of ‘Oracles of Equiano’, featuring a group of Igbo nuns, will be released on e.g. bailey’s debut album, AMERICAN AFRIKAN, in 2010 on Tru Ruts/Speakeasy Records.
Free download of E.G. Bailey’s ‘Blues People’
E.G. BAILEY’S ‘BLUES PEOPLE’
Surprising + Refreshing
blue black and beautiful
are we
many colors
the sun. god’s breath
whispering through song
through wombs, pregnant
with freedom
‘He makes language live.’ – Amiri Baraka
Tru Ruts/Speakeasy Records presents a free download of spoken word artist E.G. BAILEY’s ‘Blues People’, from his upcoming album, AMERICAN AFRIKAN. The free download is available at these links:
egbailey.bandcamp.com • myspace.com/truruts • myspace.com/egbailey
Zshare • Direct Download to Computer
‘Blues People’, a call to peoples across the diaspora, looks towards hope for those still struggling in this new world. Bailey utilizes imagery in a skillful and refreshing way in speaking about the multiplicity of the Black experience in America. Marrying it against a jazz-inspired musical backdrop couldn’t have been a smarter choice. It allows the poetry to have a grandeur and resonance. Recorded live in Minneapolis’ nationally recognized spoken word scene, and performed alongside saxophonist Andy Shaffer, of ‘New Orleans Swamp Pop’ outfit, Skinny Longfeet, there is a raw guttural tonality informing the relationship between the music and words. Evoking a call and response, reminiscent of early gospel and blues, the piece allows each to maintain it’s own identity while carefully courting the space between one another.
Bailey’s astute relationship with the rhythm of language, coupled with his academic background as both a student and teacher of poetry, is prevalent in his musical and metaphorical choices. As Bailey has stated, the poem, winner of the Hughes Knight Diop Poetry Award from the Gwendolyn Brooks Writers Conference, strives to tell the history of Africans in America through the craft of writing. It provokes you to connect with the pain of that struggle. A well crafted piece of spoken word, it continues to show why e.g. bailey can be found at the forefront of the art form.
Bailey’s spoken word opus, American Afrikan, will be released in early 2010. Recent spotlights on e.g. bailey:
‘Twin Towers’ • ‘Home at Last’ • ‘From Chains to Change’
For more information: Tru Ruts • E.G. Bailey • Andy Shaffer
‘Twin Towers’ review on 612 to 651
E.G. Bailey: “Twin Towers”
by Justin Schell
On this 8th anniversary of the events of 9/11, e.g. bailey has crafted “Twin Towers” an eloquent statement that both captures the emotions and experiences of 9/11 as well as how to respond and remember them.
The piece opens with singer, guitarist and fellow Trú Rúts artist Chastity Brown. She delivers the first part of bailey’s poem, a collage of observations that sound like fragments of a broken news report, the frame through which many saw the events of 9/11.
No death today
No war
No justice come undone
Reports say peace is on the way.
Yet this news report flips the usual broadcasts of death and destruction associated with 9/11, setting the stage for a poem that looks forward to something greater, something better than images of smoking towers. Brown’s dirge-like intonations of “And I watched the buildings crumble,” however, delivered with a voice that itself sounds ash-choked, leads into the body of the poem and takes the listener back to 2001.
bailey does well to navigate the over-loaded and hyper-emotional associations with 9/11, be it jingoistic drum rolls of war, uncritical celebrations and memorializations a la “Patriot Day,” or reactionary conspiracy theories. Instead, he focuses on the bewildering experience of that day, bodies and towers falling from the Manhattan sky. He wonders “whose truth to trust” as the poem’s narrator goes “stumbling through the fog” (one of more than just ash, smoke, and debris), while children and lovers suddenly find themselves alone.
The other theme of “Twin Towers” is how to remember these events, be it 8 or 80 years afterwards. bailey calls for unity, a familiar theme of course in 9/11 responses, but his has a critical edge. The unity he calls for is not for a nation to wage war in hopes of short-sighted revenge, but rather a call to humanity, his words moving swiftly from the individuals itself who died in the events 9/11 and, presumably, in America’s response to it, but rather a unity to stop these events from ever happening again without perpetuating violence, “no matter the politics of color or creed.” It is a tone of remembrance that cannot be captured by commemorative “never forget” anniversaries or lapel pins, but rather a remembrance that is as much about actively and peacefully shaping the future as it is about the past.
There are two versions of “Twin Towers,” one with the poem recorded by Twin Cities spoken word godfather J. Otis Powell, the other by bailey himself. While the words are the same, the difference is palpable. Powell’s delivery is deeper, more measured, adding a gravity and weight to the words simply through his bass intonation alone. bailey’s version, while no less meaningful or emotional, is slightly faster, and reflects more the mental state of someone actual experiencing the events, be it in person or through a screen, while Powell’s sounds much more reflective and pondering. Both versions, however, are a powerful testament not only to the past, present, and future of 9/11, but also of bailey’s skill of mobilizing poetry for contemplation, remembrance, and subtle, but no less insistent calls for action.
Originally posted on 612 to 651 blog on 11 September 2009.
Tru Ruts presents E.G. Bailey’s 9/11 Memorial ‘Twin Towers’
E.G. BAILEY’s 9/11 MEMORIAL ‘TWIN TOWERS’
A Poignant and Impressive Marriage of Poetry + Music
featuring Chasity Brown + J. Otis Powell!
Noted Twin Cities poet and producer, e. g. bailey, started writing “Twin Towers” the morning of the 9/11 attacks. Eight years later, his evocative words seem even more resonant.
Recording two versions of the track, one with bailey himself and one with renowned spoken-word artist, J. Otis Powell! (both featuring singer songwriter Chastity Brown), bailey is releasing the track on September 11, 2009 in memory of those lost and for those who continue to feel the aftereffects of the attacks every day.
Bailey’s ‘Twin Towers’ is a moving memorial encompassing the gravity of 9/11 from a 3rd person perspective while reverberating with a visceral sense of poignancy. It is an impressive yet poetic lament on this historic tragedy.
Indeed, when Brown sings, “I watched the buildings crumble,” it’s not just the physical structures she’s describing. Likewise, “what monument will be erected to honor those we mourn?” refers to something deeper than steel and concrete. She is able to effortlessly bring e.g.’s melodies to life.
The track also features an interpolation of Langston Hughes’ words describing the aftermath of the Battle of Stalingrad in his poem ‘Stalingrad: 1942′: “Out of the rubble from a dead hand lifted––/Out of the rubble from a lost voice calling––/I gather instead another world is falling”.
“Twin Towers” honors those lost while asking the all-important question: how do our spirits respond to tragedy and injustice? A testament to remembrance, peace and the power of the human spirit, the tracks are available online as free downloads at www.truruts.com.
FREE DOWNLOAD LINK:
• Free high quality audio download at Bandcamp.com: http://egbailey.bandcamp.com/
• Free Download at Zshare.com:
- Twin Towers (featuring J. Otis Powell! + Chastity Brown): http://bit.ly/ETP2q
- Twin Towers (featuring e.g. bailey + Chastity Brown): http://bit.ly/XV5Gn
• Free Download at Myspace:
http://myspace.com/truruts • http://myspace.com/egbailey
• Direct Download to your computer: http://bit.ly/twintowers
CREDITS:
1. Twin Towers (featuring J. Otis Powell! + Chastity Brown)
written by e.g. bailey; music by Chastity Brown
produced by e.g. bailey + Ben Durrant
2. Twin Towers (featuring e.g. bailey + Chastity Brown)
written by e.g. bailey; music by Chastity Brown
produced by e.g. bailey + Ben Durrant
Executive Produced by e.g. bailey + Sha Cage • Produced by e.g. bailey + Ben Durrant • Mastering: Hipgnosis • Design: Matt Wood • Art Direction: e.g. bailey
Brought to you by Trú Rúts Endeavors: Harvesting the Tree of Life.
© 2009 Tru Ruts/Speakeasy Records.
E.G. BAILEY
There is very little in the realm of Spoken Word that E.G. BAILEY has not done. One of the most prolific and innovative spoken word artists of his generation, he has been called a spoken word extraodinaire. Amiri Baraka states, ‘He makes language live.’ A multi-disciplinary Liberian American artist, who works in theatre, film, radio and spoken word, often mixing the different disciplines in his work, he has been creating work in these mediums for the last 15 years. As a performer he has worked solo, or with a band, dancers and vocalists. He is influenced by the jazz aesthetic and often works with jazz musicians, but has also worked with singer songwriters, and hip hop artists. He has been known arrived in a new city, gather an ensemble of musicians and improvise with them. He is both adaptive and versatile.
He has not only created innovative works, but founded a number of endeavors and organizations that have provided opportunties for other artists. The core of his work, whether in theatre, music, film or radio, has been grounded in the art form of spoken word. He not only practices the art form but teaches, promotes, writes about and works to advance the art form. In his work, he specializes in studying and teaching the history of spoken word, and how it has developed from the griot tradition in Afrika, and influenced literary movements throughout time, including the Harlem Renaissance, the Beat Generation, the Black Arts Movement, the Slam Movement and others. He also teaches how it helped to create the Hip Hop Movement, and how it continues to influence artists–poets, musicians and filmmakers alike. He has produced over 15 albums and singles for a number of artists in spoken word and hip hop, and produced a noted and innovative National Poetry Month radio series for 9 years. He has developed radio formats and radio shows that promote poetry, spoken word and hip hop. In the same program, you may hear Claude McKay, Daara J, Linton Kwesi Johnson, Zap Mama, Fela, Common, Langston Hughes and the Last Poets.
He is currently working on his album, ‘American Afrikan’, traversing experiences as a child born in Afrika and raised in America. It brings together Afrobeat musical stylings and spoken word, along with hip hop and other genres. It also has songs in Igbo (Nigeria), Mano (Liberia), and includes artists roots in Ghana, Guinea, Senegal, Tanzania and Germany. Part of the goal of the album is to highlight the talents of Afrikans living in the U.S., and also to show how Afrikans are influencing and changing America in the areas of music, politics and the literary arts. The first single from the album, called ‘America’, has already been well received.
e.g.bailey has won awards in poetry, filmmaking, and radio, and has traveled to South Africa, England, Bosnia, West Africa, the United Arab Emirates and more for his work. He is a winner of the Hughes Knight Diop Poetry Award and several of his poems have been published in Solid Ground, the millennial issue of Drumvoices Revue, and Warpland, a publication by the Gwendolyn Brooks Center for creative writing. He is also the co-founder of the MN Spoken Word Association, Tru Ruts/Speakeasy Records, and Arkology spoken word and music collective. Most recently he was honored at the 2009 Urban Griots Awards for “Outstanding Contributions” to the spoken word art form. To learn more about e.g. bailey, go to www.truruts.com, www.egbailey.com, or www.myspace.com/egbailey.
CHASTITY BROWN
Chastity Brown is “…a roots soul singer of the first order,” as noted by music critic, Jim Walsh. With her folk-jazz style, this Minneapolis-based singer-songwriter has been steadily winning over her audiences since the release of her debut album, “Do the Best You Can.” Playing more than 150 dates in the past year, Chastity Brown has become known as a gospel-raised, activist poet who sings about race, love, and politics with an edgy tenderness. Her lyrics are both personal, infused with a deeply rooted spirituality, and politically, ethically hard hitting. She wrote her first song at age 15 in her home state of Tennessee and began her growing repertoire in public playing saxophone, piano, drums, and guitar.
Chastity Brown is drawn to the power of music. Her fans are continually amazed at how passionately she can bring them into real life situations of overcoming struggle and then walk them out with a blues, stomp-enticing groove. In 2007, she began gigging full-time in jazz clubs, festivals, folk houses, and college campuses. She is often accompanied by Micheal X. on drums and Adam Wozniak on upright bass. www.myspace.com/chastitybrown
J. OTIS POWELL!
J. Otis Powell! is a writer, performer, educator, curator, producer, consultant and arts administrator. He is also a practitioner of Open Space Technology and has used OST for more than fifteen years with notable success in various productions, in educational scenarios, in administrative consultations and as a means to resolve conflicts. J. Otis lives and works in a jazz aesthetic while calling attention to the improviser in us all; the Open Space everywhere and artificial constructs that keep us from freedom. He is no longer preoccupied with what he has done and focused on who he is because of his experience.
Current projects include but are not limited to: writing a novel titled Bottomless Sky, a new collection of poems titled Chocolate Blue and collaborating with several individual artists on long term endeavors. He’s also working as a radio producer at KFAI Community Radio, a curator with Pangea World Theater on Bridges, as a mentor, editor and roster artist for The Givens Foundation for African American Literature, collaborating with The April Sellers Dance Collective and occasionally performing solo and with various ensembles through out the state of Minnesota and the USA. www.myspace.com/jotispowell
The Liberian Literary Tradition
“Hi E.G. I was doing a Google search of Liberian comedians and stumbled across your your name and your pieces. Man, you fascinate me. I am a student of literature and it saddens me everytime I search for liberian literature to find virtually nothing or just mediocrity. I am very excited to find that there is a guy with a liberian background doing such work as yours. I really like your self interview with Sha. keep on the good work. Liberia needs and deserves guys like you.”
I recently received this comment on my Wordlife blog/site. Always a good way to start the day, reinforcing your commitment to the passion you are constantly flaming. I struggled with the same thing when I was a student at Notre Dame University. I was an English and Philosophy major, and constantly scoured the mammoth Notre Dame Library for any evidence of Liberia literature. I coursed through countless African literary anthologies. There was a dearth of Nigerian, South African, Senegalese, Kenyan, and numerous others, but never any Liberian writings. We had to suffice with ‘proverbs’ and ‘folk tales’, of which there would be a smattering, and only at the beginning of the anthologies, as though Liberia did not have any contemporary literature. Or they would anthologize Tolson’s Libretto for the Republic of Liberia. I remembered thinking, “Could they really believe, and be saying, that there was no significant literary output in Liberia beyond the folktales that are hundreds of years old.” Granted Liberia as yet to produce a literary giant such as Achebe or Soyinka or Senghor or Césaire, but there must be some, or at least one, literary figure worthy of consideration, especially if you are anthologizing a cross section of African literature, that even if was not comparable to these esteemed figure, could at least stand out in his or her own country. I refused to believe that none existed, or that such a thing as a Liberian literary tradition was not possible. It is not an easy search because most production of literature related to Liberia is literature about Liberia, as opposed to creative work, or work by Liberians themselves. Also because the discussion on Liberia tends to center on its relation, and relationship, to America, and/or the settlement of freed slaves in the country. Later the discussion would shift almost solely to the coup, and subsequently, the civil war that ravished the country.
But Liberian poets, novelists, and essayists, do exist. In 2000, J. Kpanneh Doe wrote, “The writing of novels is rather new to the Liberian literary genre. Except for Murder in the Cassava Patch, a Liberian literary classic, there aren’t many others that can be grouped or classified as Liberian literature, or for that matter, constituting a literary tradition.” This is simply not true, and one can only assume it’s a lack of knowledge, perhaps access. One should consider Bai T. Moore, the author of Murder in the Cassava Patch, who also anthologized Liberian poetry, published his own collection, wrote novels and short stories, and contributed to the documentation of Liberian folktales. One should also consider, Wilton Sankawulo, Roland Dempster, Edwin Barclay, and a number of other poets, writers and playwrights. Also, Guanya Pau, the first novel written/published by an African, is by Liberian author, Joseph Walters (pictured above). Their work may not be readily available or easy to find; you may read about them more than you will read their work. That does not take away from their contributions. There are contemporary Liberian writers that are beginning to gain some prominence, such as K. Moses Ngabe, Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, and most recently Helene Cooper for her memoir, The House on Sugar Beach. If this stretch of literary output from 1891 to present, spreading across the various disciplines, does not constitute a literary tradition, I don’t know what can. Further, how can the first country to produce the first published African novelist be said not to have a literary tradition?
I sometimes wonder if part of my decision to become an artist, was to contribute to the Liberian literary tradition, and show that such can, and does, exist. It might require something akin to an archeological expedition, or one might have to look to the new generation of Liberian artists scattered across the Diaspora, to bring that tradition to prominence. But it is there, and with the proper resources it could be brought to light. Some might question the validity of any contribution I make to Liberian literature, or literary tradition, due to the fact that I left the country at such a young age, and having grown up in a primarily white middle class background. A telling example of this is an experience I with a University of Minnesota student, who I met by chance at a performance of a visiting, I believe, South African troupe. When she learned I was Liberia, she asked how long I had been in the US. I have become accustomed to these kinds of questions because I do not look or sound like your typical Liberian. And I could have almost guessed what was next. When my answer to her was that I had been in America for over twenty years, she replied, ‘So you’re basically American.’ I told her that I am Liberia, have always been Liberian and will be Liberian until I die. As will my children. You can insert African in here as well. This is not to negate my American heritage, because as I always say, I own that too. Therefore, the East and the West, the African and American, are my domain. They are mine to celebrate and to challenge. I finished the conversation telling her, ‘When you’ve been in America for over 20 year, let me know if you’re still Liberian.’
I cannot even begin to consider myself in the company of African scribes that my taught me, inspired me and secured me, from Achebe to p’Bitek, from Kenyatta to Bessie Head, but I hope that I can at least make some modicum of contribution to the literary works of my people, even if it is just the Mano/Gio people of Liberia. Albeit not all my work is about Liberia, but I am not sure that it needs to be in order to be part of the tradition. We are in a new age, part of a new generation, and many of us are transplanted across the global, and depending on the environment in which we live, our themes cannot always be about home. However, our address is still part of the chorus of voices of our people, no matter where they reside, no matter what age and time they occupy, no matter what struggles they face. Responses like one above give me encouragement that I am making even the slightest difference.
‘Brother, can you spare a rhyme?’
Brother, can you spare a rhyme?
If anyone knows how to survive a recession, it’s a poet.
By Kristin Tillotson, Star Tribune
Dollars and Cents
Carol Connolly, St. Paul poet laureate
Money is the color of mold.
Use it for a poultice
And it will infect your wound.
And you, you are
Bad if you have it,
Bad if you don’t,
Bad if you try to get it,
Bad if you refuse it,
Bad if you lend it,
Bad if you borrow it,
Bad if you win it,
Bad if you lose it,
Foolish if you inherit it,
Suspect if you ignore it.
Its fungus creeps
into the corners of marriages,
suffocates sons and daughters.
If you marry for money,
you will earn it.
Factory workers, middle managers and stockbrokers who have been laid off during the recession could learn a thing or two from poets.
That’s right. You think you have it bad; try being someone whose gift and lifelong passion is often dismissed as effete or superfluous by those with “real” jobs and only gets ridiculed more as times get tougher.
“Poets aren’t recession-proof,” said Tom Cassidy, who supports his “poetry addiction” with a full-time job. “We’re just more resilient than most, able to leap tall challenges in a single stanza.”
But Twin Cities poets aren’t having a pity party. If anyone knows how to survive when the going gets lean, it’s them.
“Artists in general are somewhat better equipped to live in a cashless economy, because we’ve already spent our adult lives not earning much money,” said Naomi Cohn, who supports herself as a fundraiser for nonprofit organizations. “At the post office, I talked to some grandfather who worked his behind off for 40 years and now his 401(k) is tanked. I was running around being a bad girl, and now we’re in the same place.”
Poet/spoken-word artist e.g. bailey is well aware that the general public might not think that he and others like him make or deserve much money.
“Part of the job of being an artist is working with what you have to create what you can,” he said.
“Out of lack, ingenuity flourishes,” bailey said. “If it means getting only $25 for a show, or sometimes doing it for free, you do it. If it means performing in a bar, hell, even the street corner, you do it. If it means teaching at a school or after-school program, on top of doing your work as an artist, you do it. And you scrape together whatever means you have, economic or otherwise, to eat, sleep and live to another day. I know a good number of poets and spoken-word artists doing pretty good for themselves. Sometimes they know how to better ride these waves when they come along.”
While our poets aren’t sulking in a corner, waiting for the grant money they’re less likely to see than a unicorn, they would like to point out — articulately and genteelly — that, in fact, they are not only necessary in a bad economy, but more so.
“‘Neither a borrower nor a lender be’ could be the best financial advice of the early 21st century,” wrote poet Todd Boss, whose work has appeared in the New Yorker, in his online journal FLURRY. “The fact that it was written by a poet and not an economist shouldn’t surprise you. Because poets have little to gain in this world, they have little to sell — so they can be trusted, trusted to tell you the unvarnished truth about the world we live in, what it’s worth, and how you ought to invest in it.”
At this year’s Minnesota Book Awards ceremony, poetry finalists Boss, Heid Erdrich, Tim Nolan and Margaret Hasse composed a manifesto. It read, in part:
“In these financially perilous times, poetry becomes an index of life’s real riches. Poetry’s intangible topics — surprise, joy, memory, laughter, loss, love, beauty, and wonder — can return us to a more honest living. A poem is an economical experience that deepens the value of being alive. A poem can be read in minutes, but sustain for years — an energy reserve that is cheap, totally renewable, eco-friendly, and immensely rewarding.”
To any young dreamer who aspires to become a poet, but is waffling due to the uncertain economy, no less a success than John Patrick Shanley has some advice. The Pulitzer and Oscar-winning playwright/ screenwriter (“Doubt,” “Moonstruck”) recently delivered a college commencement address that included this recommendation: “… not to bring up something upsetting, but when you leave here today, you may go through a period of unemployment. My suggestion is this: Enjoy the unemployment. Have a second cup of coffee. Go to the park. Read Walt Whitman. Walt Whitman loved being unemployed. I don’t believe he ever did a day’s work in his life. As you may know, he was a poet. If a lot of time goes by and you continue to be unemployed, you may want to consider announcing to all appropriate parties that you have become a poet.”
Here are some poems related to money woes, beginning with a soon-to-be-published new one by the late, beloved Bill Holm.
e.g. bailey + Sha Cage direct Poetic Assassins play
What: Sai Werd Ink Presents…
Poetic Assassins Eliminating Oppression One Ink Shell at a Time
When: Friday and Saturday April 24th + 25th 7:00 pm
Where:Old Arizona Theatre 28th and Nicollet Ave (Free Parking in lot across street)
Directed by Sha Cage and eg bailey
www.saiwerdink.com
Sai Werd Ink artists Poetic Assassins enter the second season of their hip hop theatre production “Eliminating Oppression One Ink Shell at a Time” at the historic Old Arizona Theatre. The Poetic Assassins are winners of the 20009 VERVE grant and are a dynamic spoken word duo dedicated to creating positive change in the community. The play follows the two as they use their words to “assassinate” the evils in the world such as: homophobia, racism, sexism, gender roles, prison industrial complex just to name a few. It is followed by a rhyme and reason session were the audience is invited to ask questions of the artists and engage in dialogue about the complex issues presented during the play. Featuring Verse, B.U.G.S., Crystal Ruiz, Adrian Waters, Jake Virden.
This production runs for one weekend only. Tickets are available at the door. Recommended for audiences 13+ due to language and content.
Word Beat I Powa 2009
Note: Each year, the Echo Chamber presents their annual ‘Word Beat I Powa’ dub poetry special. The special brings together a great collection of dub poetry with ventures into beat poetry and spoken word. It’s consistently one of my favorite shows of the year, and turns me on to new dub poetry and spoken word. I’ve had the privilege of being a guest on the show in the past, and am blessed to be featured on the show. Below is information on this year’s special.
On April 22, 2009 the Echo Chamber presented the annual “Word Beat I Powa” dub poetry, beat poetry, and spoken word special. Of course, it was dub poetry that set the foundation and included the dub poets Oku Onoura, Mutabaruka, Royal African Soldiers, Jean Binta Breeze, Benjamin Zephaniah, Oliver Smith, and of course, the incomparable Linton Kwesi Johnson. Other slices of dub poetry included the new Dub Gabriel track “Spirit Made Flesh” (featuring Karen Gibson Roc); the extremely chilled “No Ordinary Life” from JEN & Chin Chillaz; and the very cool “Dilly Dally” from the Brooklyn Funk Essentials (featuring Everton Sylvester). But there was more than dub poetry. As always, the “Word Beat I Powa” special included some beat poetry (with readings from Jack Kerouac, Gregory Corso, & Allen Ginsberg) and some great Jamaican DJs (including U-Roy, Prince Buster, I-Roy, and Dennis Alcapone). One of the highlighted rhymesayers was KFAI’s own e.g. bailey with his fantastic “America” and 2 other poems (including “Griots”). Finally, we included poems and other spoken word gems from Jah Wobble (feat. Ronnie Drew); the new Heavyweight Dub Champions album (feat. Dr. Israel & Elf Transporter); Cool Hipnoise (feat. Last Poets); The Fire This Time (feat. Assata Shakur); Dr. Echo (feat. Solange St.Croix); Symarip (aka Roy Ellis); Dr. Ring-Ding; and the incomparable Ken Nordine. And, to complete the word-beat chaos, DJ Baby Swiss included the “Green Slime” trailer and soundbytes from the original “Space Ghost” cartoon on top of some heavy taiko beats from Kodo.
The Echo Chamber is 3 hours of the best in dub, reggae, downbeat club, and percussion heavy world music. Hosted by Dr. StrangeDub & DJ Baby Swiss. Find all the Echo Chamber playlists at: http://www.kfai.org/node/68. And check the MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/doctorstrangedub
