A Poetry Night at the Green Mill

With host Marc Smith (pictured above) and featured poet Taylor Mali of NYC (pictured below).

Sweet goodnight poems for her

Our original idea for this feature was to record Marc Smith, inventor of the poetry slam, doing his own dynamic, heartfelt poetry on a typical Sunday night at the legendary Green Mill (Chicago, IL, USA) where he has been the most masterful of Master of Ceremonies for over a decade. We wanted to capture Marc’s poetry but also to highlight his marvelous way of working with the crowd and poets throughout the night. Once the mics were turned on, however, we decided to record the entire evening and give you a complete Sunday Evening at the Green Mill. So we let the tape roll and as a result, you can listen to almost two and a half hours of poetry, including the open mic, featured poet Taylor Mali, and a 7-poet slam judged by 3 highly idiosyncratic judges whose qualifications, as Marc attests, are non-existent. The piano accompaniment was masterfully played by David Flippo.

Incidentally, Taylor Mali was a wonderful feature who truly blew the audience away and who you may recognize from his major role in the movie SlamNation.

It was also our good fortune that C. J. Laity of Chicagopoetry.com was there on the night of May 6 and wrote a review which is posted on his website. What a nice reminder of what journalism is for!

Click here to stream the entire show.
Click here to stream just the open mic segment.
Click here to stream just the feature, Taylor Mali.
Click here to stream just the slam contest.