Words on Tap

Contact: wordsontap@email.com

Frothy literary night Words on Tap returns to the Chemic Tavern Friday October 25th with another fantastic line-up, featuring the newly appointed Derbyshire Poet Laureate Helen Mort, Canadian spoken word maestro Jeff Cottrill, experimental musician/wordsmith Martin Christie and Ian Parks, "the finest love poet of his generation". Plus, a very special announcement concerning a forthcoming Words on Tap event, and the usual open-mic section. You simply must be there.
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Helen Mort was born in Sheffield in 1985, and grew up in nearby Chesterfield. Her first collection ‘Division Street’ is published by Chatto & Windus and is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. Five times winner of the Foyle Young Poets Award, she received an Eric Gregory Award in 2007 and won the Manchester Young Writer Prize in 2008. She has published two pamphlets with tall-lighthouse press, the shape of every box and a pint for the ghost (a Poetry Book Society Pamphlet Choice, 2010), and her poems have appeared in the Spectator, Poetry Review and The Manhattan Review. In 2010, she became Poet in Residence at the Wordsworth Trust, Grasmere. She lives in Derbyshire and is the current Derbyshire Poet Laureate.

Jeff Cottrill is a writer, spoken-word artist, journalist and occasional actor from Toronto, Canada. With blunt humour and a satirical tone, he likes to make his audience laugh, cringe or preferably both. For more than a decade, Jeff has performed in many, many readings and shows throughout Canada, England and parts of the U.S. He has authored four chapbooks and recorded two CDs; he has also toured with a one-man show, Grouch on a Couch. This is Jeff's fourth U.K. mini-tour; he previously performed in Leeds at Wicked Words. Jeff likes movies, travel and puppies.

Martin Christie mixes spoken/sung word and electronic music to create a soundscape of beat poetry and storytelling under the name Poet & the Loops. He is also lead vocalist and song writer for the band Old Man Pie striving to write lyrically deep reflections on modern life. As a solo artist Martin has played a variety of festivals including the Worcestershire Literature Festival, Preston Tringe and Chorlton Arts Festival. He also played a set at Parklife Festival in Manchester last year. He has published his own account of travelling the UK and playing a variety of open mic nights in his book ‘Open Mic Travels’ and also helped to run nights such as Words V Music in Manchester and The Wallscratcher Club in London. Influences for his hybrid spoken word and music include the 60s beat poets including Ed Sanders, through to Gil Scott-Heron, John Cooper Clarke and hip hop poets such as Sage Francis and George the Poet. He is also an avid consumer of poetry with a preference for lesser known and challening poets such as John G Hall and Alan Keogh in Manchester, and Leanne Bridgewater in Coventry, to name but a few. For Words on Tap, expect a specially assembled mix of reverse spoken word, acoustic loops, kaossilator and limited vocal effects. Check out some of his work here:
www.soundcloud.com/poetandtheloops

Ian Parks' latest collection, The Cavafy Variations, is a Poetry Book Society Choice. His collections include Shell Island, Love Poems 1979-2009, The Landing Stage, and The Exile's House. He is the editor of Versions of the North: Contemporary Yorkshire Poetry. He was writer in residence at Glasdstone's Library in 2012 and is currently Writing Fellow at De Montfort University, Leicester.

Entry: FREE

Time: 7:30pm