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Mid South Grand Slam Final

Presented by Youth Speaks Nashville at TSU - TE Poag Auditorium

April 2, 2011

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The region’s top youth poets, emcees, and spoken word artists will take the mic and ascend to their finest hour at the Mid South Grand Slam Final. The event will determine which teens will represent the region in the San Francisco Bay Area this summer at the Brave New Voices spoken word poetry festival.

New York City’s Mahogany Browne will be hosting this year’s slam event. Mahogany led the New York teen slam team to the championship last year in Los Angeles. She is also an accomplished poet and performer as well as host and curator of the renowned Nuyorican Poet’s Café Friday night slam series.

In its fourth year, the Mid South Grand Slam Final is a combination of individual and team poetry competitions in which writers are scored from 0 to 10 by five Olympic-style judges based on their writing and performance. The event will feature an individual and team competition in two divisions; one division for poets between the ages of 14 and 18 and one division for poets between the ages of 18 and 22. New this year, MTSU, Vanderbilt, Belmont, TSU, and Fisk will send their leading individual poets to the stage to determine the top college word master.

Earlier this month, a high school Memphis poet moved onto the finals stage after winning a statewide semifinal slam in partnership with Poetry Out Loud and the Tennessee Arts Commission. Youth Speaks Nashville will be holding additional semifinal events to winnow the field. On Friday, March 18th, Rutherford and Williamson County poets will compete at Walnut House at 116 North Walnut in Murfreesboro beginning at 6:30p. On Friday, March 25th at 6:00p, Davidson County poets will compete at Rocketown at 601 4th Avenue South. In the afternoon on Saturday, April 2nd, a series of semifinal events will determine the remaining finalists. Find a full schedule at youthspeaksnashville.org.

Last year in the 14 to 18 year old division, Hunters Lane’s Sebastian Jones was the individual champion and Hume Fogg won the team competition. In the 18 to 22 year old division, Belmont’s Levi Gordon won the individual title and Belmont and TSU tied in the team competition. The region’s teen slam team reached the semifinals at Brave New Voices in Los Angeles in 2010 and looks forward to improving their standing this year.