GUELPH – The Canadian Festival of Spoken Word (CFSW), a national, nomadic, annual spoken word festival will be hosted for the second year in Guelph. The festival takes place from Oct. 13 to 19.
The original intent of the festival, to provide a national showcase for poetry slam talent, has expanded to include an array of spoken word panels, showcases, workshops and other events designed to facilitate the growth and vibrancy of the Canadian spoken word and poetic communities.
A poetry slam, is an interactive, spoken word competition where performance poets present original writing and randomly-selected audience members to judge the art with scorecards.
The team of poets with the highest score moves on in the competition and the winning team will be crowned the 2019 National Slam Champions.
This year’s CFSW theme “Discovery” speaks to “The Story Within Us.”
Local and regional highlights include Guelph’s Lisa Baird reading poetry from her recently published book Winter Cold Girls and organization Art Not Shame running a workshop co-presented with Guelph Arts Council.
Longtime former Kitchener-Waterloo folk artist Janice Jo Lee will perform excerpts from her musical satire Will You Be My Friend plus a workshop.
