ROCKPILE Performance with Burnett Thompson and The New Columbia Orchestra at Busboys and Poets

ROCKPILE is a collaboration between David Meltzer, legendary poet, musician, and essayist, and Michael Rothenberg,poet, songwriter and editor of Big Bridge Press. In the tradition of the troubadour and with the spirit of improvisation and collaboration, the duo will journey through eight U.S. cities and perform poetry, composed on the road, in a spontaneous fusion with local musicians in each city. Washington DC is the 4th stop of the ROCKPILE journey.

When: November 4, 2009 ‐ 9:00 PM

Where: Busboys and Poets 2021 14th St. NW Washington DC (202)387‐9757

Ticket Information: $10 at the door.

About ROCKPILE:
ROCKPILE , joins poetry and music and is intended to educate and preserve, as well as create a history of collaboration between musicians and writers. It will help to both introduce and reinforce the tradition of the troubadour, on and off the road, for all generations. The tour will continue to New Orleans, Washington DC, New York, Chicago and St. Louis. Interviews and conversations with the local musicians will take place before the performances and become a part of the “on the road ROCKPILE
journal” as it grows from city to city and evolves with each performance. The ROCKPILE journey will be documented online (http://www.bigbridge.org/rockpile/)with daily performance clips, excerpts from the evolving journal, interviews, video and audio files. The tour will conclude in San Francisco, where poets, songwriters and musicians of the Bay Area and beyond, will gather in the troubadour tradition, to share, through poetry and music, the story of the ROCKPILE journey as a final grand performance.

E. Ethelbert Miller Reads The 5th Inning at Hue-Man Bookstore in New York City

Bid on Fabulous Auction Items - and Benefit Split This Rock

Split This Rock's auction items, to be auctioned off at a party at Busboys and Poets Thursday night, have been generating so much excitement that we've decided to open the bidding to email bids. So, even if you live in Maine, or have to work Thursday night, you can still bid.

Here's how it's going to work. Peruse the list of auction items detailed below. Choose what you'd like to bid on and send us an email at info [at] splitthisrock [dot] org. Please include the following information: Name, email address, phone number, which item or items you're bidding on, starting bid, and final bid (that is, the highest you are willing to go.)

We will appoint a proxy for you at the party who will bid on your behalf. We will contact you after the party only if you are the winning bidder. If two people send the same final bid for the same item, we will contact them both before the party to see if either wants to go higher. So please check your email frequently between now and 6 pm on Thursday.

That's it! Send your bids today and help support Split This Rock, your national network of socially engaged poets.

Items up for bid:



Candlelight dinner with Patricia Smith at Eatonville






Candlelight dinner with Cornelius Eady at Eatonville






A week at Wellspring House, a retreat for writers and artists in Western Massachusetts.




A Coaching Session for a Non-Profit Leader with Yael Flusberg of Y Elements







A Large Box of Giandujotti, chocolate-hazelnut confections direct from Turin, Italy

Call for Poet-Artist Collaborations from Workhouse Arts Center

From Marti Kirkpatrick, Manager of Poetic Art
I am the Studio Manager & Exhibition Coordinator for the Lorton Arts Foundation (LAF) at the Workhouse Arts Center in Lorton Virginia. The LAF, a grassroots non-profit organization is creating an all inclusive cultural arts center thru a remarkable "adaptive re-use" of the closed D.C. Correctional Facility at the historic Occoquan Workhouse. The grand opening of the first of five phases was celebrated September 2008 with the opening of 7 studio buildings for working artists, a two story gallery building and a building dedicated to the art of movement, "Mind, Body, Spirit".

This fall we will present an exhibition featuring both professional and amateur poets and artists invited to work in collaboration to produce Poetic Art. The work of art will inspire the poet's words, or the poem will inspire the artist's creation. The exhibition will open to the public Oct. 21 - Nov. 20, with an opening reception October 25, 2009 featuring a reading of submitted poetry.

The catalyst for this exhibition is very personal and whole heartily supported by the staff here at the Workhouse. My husband Ed is a photographer; I'm an abstract artist and our son Scott a poet. He performed his slam poetry not only here in Washington and Baltimore, but New York, Boston and Chicago and in 2000 won the DC Slam Poet Championship. After 9/11 and much reflection, Scott joined the Army, and during his second tour in Iraq on August 11, 2007, he and three others were killed while pursuing a sniper.

Before he joined the military the three of us were working on a collaborative exhibition of art and poetry. Of course, when he started soldiering we dropped our plans for the duration. The day before his deployment Scott said that should he not make it home we were to select a charity that helps his brothers in arms so those who wished could make a donation. Following his request we chose The Yellow Ribbon Fund . It was not long after this that I started thinking about a new direction for our art/ poetry collaboration.

Poetic Art is a benefit for Yellow Ribbon Fund which was created in early 2005 to assist our wounded troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and their families while they recuperate at Walter Reed and the National Naval Medical Center.

A full color show catalog will feature the paired art and poem to be sold as part of the fundraiser. Each participating artist and poet will receive a copy of the Show Catalog. However, none of the proceeds from the sale of the Show Catalog will be paid to the artists/poets.

All work must be for sale. Artists and Poets will retain all copyrights. LAF will take a 50% sales commission from sold work. The artists/poets will establish a single price for their combined work and determine the division between themselves of sales proceeds. Artists/poets are encouraged to donate a part or all of their sales proceeds back to LAF & YRF.

Please email me martikirkpatrick [at] lortonarts [dot] org for more information and a show prospectus.

Thank you,
Marti

Marti Deppa Kirkpatrick
Studio Manager/Exhibition Coordinator
Workhouse Arts Center
9518 Workhouse Way
Lorton, VA 22079
703 584-2946 cell 301 706-6393
http://www.lortonarts.org/ http://workhousearts.org/

Party With Split This Rock, Thursday August 27!

Featuring A.B. Spellman and Regie Cabico with the DC Youth Slam Team!



Thursday, August 27, 6-8 pm
Langston Room, Busboys and Poets
14th & V Streets, NW
Washington, DC

Split This Rock invites you to a party Thursday, August 27, 2009, 6-8 pm, in the Langston Room, Busboys and Poets at 14th and V Streets, NW. Busboys will be donating fabulous refreshments and creating a couple of funky Split This Rock cocktails.

Why party? Split This Rock has recently received nonprofit status, a crucial step on the road to becoming a permanent home for socially engaged poets from DC and nationwide. Plus, believe it or not, it's just 6 months until the second Split This Rock Poetry Festival. So we figure it's time to celebrate.

Reading and performing will be 2010 featured poet and DC leading light A.B. Spellman, along with Regie Cabico and the DC Youth Slam Team. See below for more details. Entry will be $10-$25, sliding scale, and you'll have a chance to bid on amazing prizes at auction. Come prepared for readings, for fun, for volunteer opportunities, and for celebrating! For more information: info [at] splitthisrock [dot] org or 202-787-5210.

Can't make the party? You can still volunteer - just contact us at the above email or phone. We'd love to have you involved! And you can definitely still make a donation. Just click here. Many thanks!

Poets Celebrating with Split This Rock August 27 - Join Us!

A. B. Spellman is an author, poet, critic, and lecturer. His poetry collection, Things I Must Have Known, was recently was published by Coffee House Press. He has published numerous books and articles on the arts, including Art Tatum: A Critical Biography (a chapbook), The Beautiful Days (poetry), and Four Lives in the Bebop Business, now available as Four Jazz Lives (University of Michigan Press). In recognition of Spellman's commitment and service to jazz, the National Endowment for the Arts in 2005 named one of its prestigious Jazz Masters awards the A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy. He was a poet-in-residence at Morehouse College, in Atlanta, Georgia, where he taught various courses in African-American culture, and at Emory, Rutgers, and Harvard Universities, where he offered courses in modern poetry, creative writing, and jazz.


The DC Youth Slam Team poets utilize their vocal energy and strength to channel emotions, generate a message, or participate in the artistic field they enjoy. Through their poetic works, they rejuvenate the art of poetry and create individual identities with distinct voices. These teens are the future voices of America. Welcome to the beginning of a movement.



Regie Cabico is the Director of Split This Rock's World & Me youth poetry contest and Artistic Director of Sol & Soul. Cabico is a poet, playwright, and spoken word performer. He took top prizes at the 1993, 1994, and 1997 National Poetry Slams. His work appears in over 30 anthologies and he co-edited Poetry Nation: A North American Anthology of Fusion Poetry. He received a NYFA Artist Fellowship for Poetry in 1997, NYFAs in 2003 for Poetry and Performance Art, and two Brooklyn Arts Council Poetry Awards. Cabico has been a teacher for Urban Word and developed a poetry and performance program for teens with psychiatric illness at Bellevue Hospital. He received the 2006 Writers for Writers Award from Poets & Writers in recognition of his work with diverse communities.

Upcoming August Events - Sunday Kind of Love, Terrance Hayes Workshop, and Celebration

New Shadows: Moving Poems from Imitation to Innovation
a workshop with Terrance Hayes
Saturday, August 15, 1-3pm

The workshop is full--to be added to the waiting list, contact Melissa at melissa.dcpaw [at] gmail [dot] com.

This workshop is intended to help new poets help themselves. It will offer concrete strategies for sustained writing when the only teacher available is a book. We will explore the ways inventive imitation (Think of imitation as transformation not reproduction.) can lead to poetic discovery and innovation by discussing and then imitating published poems from a multitude of styles and traditions.

Terrance Hayes' most recent poetry collection, Wind in a Box (Penguin 2006), was named by Publishers Weekly as one of the best 100 books of 2006. His other books of poetry are Hip Logic (2002), which won the National Poetry Series Open Competition, and Muscular Music (1999), which won the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. Poems in Lighthead, his collection forthcoming from Penguin in 2010, have appeared in journals such as the American Poetry Review, Poetry, and The New Yorker. His honors include a Whiting Writers Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He is Professor of Creative Writing at Carnegie Mellon University and lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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SUNDAY KIND OF LOVE
Featuring Terrance Hayes
Sunday, August 16, 4-6pm
Langston Room; Busboys and Poets
@ 14th & V

Featuring Terrance Hayes. Hosted by Melissa Tuckey and special guest Regie Cabico.

Sunday Kind of Love happens the 3rd Sunday of every month in the Langston Room at Busboys & Poets, 14th Street NW (V & 14th Streets NW, U Street/Cardozo metro). Sponsored by Busboys and Poets and Split This Rock Poetry Festival, with support from the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities.
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mothertongue presents Jenny C. Lares (plus open mic)
August 19, 9pm, The Black Cat,
1811 14th St. NW, Washington, DC
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Celebrate our Non-Profit Status with Us at Busboys
August 27, 6-8 p.m. in the Langston Room at Busboys and Poets
Suggestion donation 10-25 dollars.
There will be readings, an auction, volunteer opportunities, and lots of poetry and love. Save the Date!

Support Arts Funding in the District

Dear Friends,

The DC Advocates for the Arts are fighting against the cuts in the local arts budget. Please sign the petition letter below, and ask your networks - artists and arts organization folk - to sign on. Even if you are not tagged in this note, please add your name, affiliation, and the ward(s) in which you work as a comment here [note - this is a Facebook petition - if you comment on Blog This Rock, we will forward to DC Advocates to the Arts] to add your name to this petition. The deadline for signatures is Thursday at 2pm. This is a NOW do this NOW kind of ask.

Sincerely,

Rob Bettmann
--------------------


To: The Honorable Chairman Vincent C. Gray and the members of the District of Columbia Council
From: The DC Advocates for the Arts
Date: July 25, 2009

As has been documented by local and national media, the arts community is in crisis. Now is not the time to cut arts funding. To do so would undermine all of the investments that have been made building the local arts economy over the last thirty years.

The draft FY 10 budget cuts arts funding for the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities by 37%, at the same time that private donations and foundation giving are down. Restoring funding to FY 2009 levels would give the arts community the time and confidence to leverage the city's support, and to continue serving the citizens of DC and the millions of visitors who come to the nation's capital each year. The additional money will have minimal impact on the overall budget, but it would provide great benefit to Washington's children and families, and our city's economy.

In FY 2009, the 14 million dollars allocated to the DC Commission supported arts education programming for thousands of DC school children, in every ward. That same investment contributed to city tax revenue by supporting the businesses of artists and arts organizations in every ward. The council would be wise to sustain its support of the arts reflective of the value that we provide on expenditure.

The city has invested heavily in the arts over the last thirty years, supporting programming and institutions. Now is not the time to undermine that progress. The creative economy can be part of the solution to the current economic and community crisis, and we ask you to: return funding to FY 2009 levels and to engage now with the DC Advocates for the Arts in a discussion to define priorities for arts spending for FY 2011. Now is not the time to slash investment that creates revenue, and supports jobs.

Sincerely,

Robert Bettmann (Founder, Day Eight, All wards; and Chair, DC Advocates for the Arts)
George Koch (Founder, Artomatic, All wards; Steering committee, DC Advocates for the Arts)
Ava Spece (Executive Director, DC Youth Orchestra, All Wards; Steering committee, DC Advocates for the Arts)
Varissa McMickens (Executive Director, DC Arts and Education Collaborative, All wards; Steering committee, DC Advocates for the Arts)
David Furchgott (President, International Arts and Artists, Ward 2 and All)

We will present this to the city council late Thursday afternoon. The more signatures the better. If you want to really help, write your own note, and tag a member of our steering committee in it so that we track signatures.