Category: News

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A PPP 2024 Retrospective

Ten days till 2024 bids us farewell, and it only seems like yesterday that we were making grand plans about what we’d do this year…. The other night, over a few beers, we scribbled down a list of everything we actually managed to do over the past twelve months. It’s pretty impressive (if we say so ourselves).

Yes We Cant (that’s our monthly poetry night, if you didn’t know) celebrated its 7th birthday in June – Liz Berry headlined! – and is still an online event. One of our priorities in 2025 is finding a venue with full disabled access and excellent wi-fi so we can start running in-person hybrid events. Watch this space for more news on that.

We’ve also kept serving regular helpings of PASTA (our open-mic night) at Arena Theatre in Wolverhampton. Between that and Yes We Cant, we reckon we’ve provided at least two hundred open-mic opportunities over the year. You couldn’t ask for a better snapshot of the health of our local grass-roots poetry scene!

On top of that, we’ve run poetry slams in Wolverhampton, Shrewsbury, and Ironbridge. We’ve worked on poetry projects with Good Shepherd in Wolverhampton, and Caldmore Community Gardens in Walsall, and offered Poetry on Demand at BlackBerry Fair in Shropshire. We took Wolverhampton poets up to Morecambe Poetry Festival for a showcase (they smashed it), and this autumn we set up a new writers’ group in Willenhall which is already going from strength to strength.

Away from poetry – but very much in touch with our passion for championing our region – we ran an oral history project about the Tavern in the Town rock pub in Wolverhampton, collecting stories and anecdotes and memories, working with photographer Nicole Lovell, distributing 2000 copies of a free newspaper, and putting on an exhibition in Wolverhampton city centre. All the material we collected is now with Wolverhampton City Archives, but you can see what we did here.

We’ll be winding down a little over the festive period, but never quite stopping. We’ve entries to the Wolves Lit Fest poetry comp to log – that closes as the year ends – while on Boxing Day we’ll be drawing names out of the PPP Hat of Poetry Chance to see who’s going to be part of the Wolves Lit Fest slam. If you fancy taking part, you’ve got till midnight on Xmas Eve to get in touch. Oh, and tickets for the slam make excellent Xmas presents, if you’re in the market for last-minute shopping.

The festival itself runs from 31 Jan – 2 Feb and has a host of great events (we’re delighted that Hollie McNish gig is already sold out!). We’ll be there all weekend, running the Fringe Room, putting on Stars of Slam, and looking after the Writers’ Hub. If you pop along (and why wouldn’t you?) be sure to come and say hallo.

Wishing you all the very best over the festive season, however you (do or don’t) celebrate it. And may 2025 be good to every last one of you. You deserve it.

Ho Ho Ho

PPP

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Busy weekend for the pandemonialists!

Tomorrow, we’re at BlackBerry Fair in Whitchurch. This is one of our favourite events of the year – we spend all day sitting on a sofa at the side of the high street, writing bespoke poems for folk who’ve come along to enjoy and take part in the festival. Over the years, we’ve written dozens: for grandparents and grandchildren, pet dogs and pirates. We can’t say how much we love this – although that love has been tested in years when the weather’s been a bit grim. We get to chat with so many fascinating people, and we never know what we’re going to be asked to write about next. It may not be every poet’s cup of tea, but it’s definitely ours! If you’re there, pop by and say hallo.

On Sunday afternoon we’re back in the West Midlands, at Caldmore Community Gardens in Walsall, running an open mic to celebrate nature (and National Poetry Day). Gracey Bee is our MC, it’s free to attend, it’ll be fun and friendly, and there may well be samosas. If you’ve a poem you want to read, or just want to come along and listen, you’ll be very welcome.

And once that’s finished, we hotfoot it over to Zoom for October’s Yes We Cant. Our headliner this month is Jonathan Humble, the man behind Dirigible Balloon, and our ‘Alf Ender is Ash Bainbridge. All the open mic spots have been filled already, but there’s still time to join our audience. Get in touch if you fancy curling up on your sofa with some great poetry to round off your weekend.

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Mappa Mundi

Many years ago, when the world was still young [2018: ed] we found ourselves looking for an easily accessible listing of West Midlands poetry events, with all the necessary details for folk who might be interested in going along to them, and found… nothing. So we decided to do something about it, and – being cheeky wee scraps – we created our very own Mappa Mundi, listing all the events and venues we could. We still believe that in doing so, we corrected the appalling oversight in the original Hereford map, which – for all its qualities – is next to useless for poets.

Then Covid happened, live poetry took something of a back seat, and the need for our Mappa Mundi fell away. We put it in the back of a dusty cyber-drawer, and forgot about it. Almost. Finding ourselves with a little time on our hands this summer, we unrolled it, laid it out on a table, and set about updating it. It turns out that some of the poetry nights from our 2018 map are still flourishing. Others have disappeared. And there are a fair few new kids on the block, too, as the regional poetry scene evolves and changes, ebbs and flows.

You’ll find all of them here https://pandemonialists.co.uk/mappa-mundi/ There’s the wonderful image designed by artist Catherine Pascall Moore, which tips its hat at the Hereford Mappa, while all the poetry and spoken word events are on a slightly more modern and tech-friendly Google map. We’ve included nights which lie just outside the West Mids county too, because why not? Who wouldn’t fancy a trip to Worcester, or Ironbridge, or Hinckley to listen to poetry once in a while? And if you run a regular event we don’t know of, get in touch and we’ll add it to the listing.

The poets list on the map? We know that’s not up to date. And we’ll get round to revamping that at some point. But for now, use this list of events to get out there, listen to poetry, share your own, meet people, and keep this regional, grassroots arts scene thriving.

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Ironbridge Slam – September 2024

It was an incredible Ironbridge Slam 2024 yesterday. A lovely venue and an almost impossible job for the judges. Top notch poetry and performance all afternoon until we finally crowned our winner Brenda Read-Brown. With David Braziel in 2nd place and Ryan Kenny in 3rd. Thanks to everyone who joined us, to the venue for being such wonderful hosts and the techs who made everything go seamlessly.

See you next year.

And if you enjoyed the music played before the event and during the interval…

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Wolves Lit Fest

As a new year races into our vision like an excitable puppy it’s time for PPP to start preparing for Wolverhampton Lit Fest. Since its inception we’ve run events as part of the festival and this year is no exception.

It all starts for us on Saturday 3rd February 2024 when we curate the Fringe Room taking placein the Arena Theatre. All five performances are pay-as-you-feel and it starts off with a trio you might have heard of. Yes, we kick off the event with our Pass the Poetry Parcel show.

Then, rather than rest and go to the pub we instead bring you another four shows from Tina
Sederholm, Dan Webber, Rose Condo and duo Willis the Poet and Ben Moore. We also have the Poetry Competition Winners Showcase event at 4.30pm in the same building. If you get there early you technically don’t need to leave the building for six hours so bring your slippers.

After a quick break we then run (well, amble gracefully) over the road to the Art Gallery for the Stars of the Slam event. Jemima Hughes, Matt Jones, Kieren King, Chloe Jacquet and Colin Wells have all earned their place in poetry folklore by winning slams somewhere on this isle and we’re putting them in a single place, at a single time for your enjoyment. All for a fiver. It’s like inflation never happened.

Then the poetry Gods allow us to sleep for a few hours before returning to the Art Gallery on Sunday for the Writers’ Hub. From 11am to 6pm a bevy of local writers’ groups have some time to share their work. All the events are free. Jonathan Davidson from Writing West Midlands will also have a stall at the event for you to find out more about the work WWM do in the region. It’s yet another day you might want to bring your slippers.

And finally on Friday 9th February we have the now legendary Wolverhampton Lit Fest Poetry Slam. Again we’re at the Arena. Tickets are £12 and you can even watch on the livestream if you want to sit in your own home in your slippers. PPP Slams are always special events and the Wolves Lit Fest slam is the specialest of the special. Our hometown slam, in what is usually a packed theatre. Get your tickets sharpish because this can sell out.

With all that buzz, it’s no wonder the puppy is so excited. We hope to see you at one or more (or all!) of the events.

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Ironbridge Festival poetry competition results

The results for this year’s Ironbridge Festival poetry competition are now out. Congratulations to our winner, Helen Kay, and all other winning and shortlisted poets. Our thanks to our judge, Pat Edwards, and to every single poet who entered. We wish you all the very best with your submissions to other competitions in future. You can read the full list of winners and shortlisted poets here: https://pandemonialists.co.uk/ironbridge-poetry-competition-2023/

If you’re in and around Ironbridge next Sunday (October 15th) we’re holding a prizewinners’ event at Coalbrookdale Community Centre, from 11.30am, where some of the winning poets will be reading their poems, Pat Edwards will say a few words about the judging process, and poets who submitted to the TF postcode part of the competition will also have the opportunity to read. Entry is free, and everyone is welcome to come along and listen. We hope to see you there!

best wishes
PPP

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Yes We Cant in Asgard

Last night we took Yes We Cant back to Walsall, and held our first ever hybrid event at the wonderful Asgard Games in the town centre. It’s a perfect venue: large, airy, clean, comfortable, welcoming. And it has a bar. What’s not to like?

Our goal was to recreate the warmth, atmosphere, and enjoyment of Yes We Cant as it used to be at the Pretty Bricks, while also ensuring that we brought our Zoom audience with us – we’ve spent three years sharing our events with them, and they’ve taught us a lot about the importance of accessibility and how we need to facilitate it. We’d finally found a venue, now we just had to make it work.

We kept it simple. Booked a great headline poet, a compelling ‘Alf Ender, filled the open mic spots, and threw open the physical and virtual doors to anyone who wanted to come. And reader, they came. Dave MCed, Steve looked after the webcam, and Emma chatted with the Zoom attendees. S Reeson (thank you!) rolled up her sleeves and got stuck in, too. Everything ran like a dream. The open mic poets? Brilliant. Our ‘Alf Ender, Tina Cole? Fantastic. Headliner Ben Davis? Hilarious.

And the feedback? It couldn’t be better.

“You did a brilliant job tonight. I’ve been to 3 previous hybrids and they were unsuccessful due to poor sound and a feeling of isolation in the zoom room. Yours was perfect.”

“Dear PPP, the first hybrid YWC was a triumph. Great sound and video quality, felt like I had a front row seat. All the performers knocked it out the park. Thank you all again for making your event genuinely inclusive. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to the next one.”

We’re over the moon, Brian. Over the chuffing moon.

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October Yes We Cant

We are excited to announce the news that on Sunday October 1st we’ll be having our first ever hybrid Yes We Cant. Our flagship poetry night has been a purely online event since the pandemic, but we’re dipping our toes back into the real-world water, and heading back to Walsall to for an evening which will be both online and in the delightful physical space that is Asgard Games.

Whether you want to join us via Zoom or be with us at Asgard, we’d love you to come along and be part of this. Our headliner for the night will be the outrageously hilarious Ben Davis, while our ‘Alf Ender will be Tina Cole. There’ll be ten open mic places, there’s good ales, and the night remains – as ever – a pay-as-you-feel event.

With this being our first-ever  attempt at running a hybrid event, we need to run through a bit of housekeeping so we all know what to expect….

1. At this event, Zoom attendees will purely be able to watch and listen to what’s happening, as well as interact with PPP via the chat function. We know this isn’t ideal, but we’re learning how to do this as we go along, and hope to build on what we can do over time. We’re also going to find out just how easy/difficult it is to work an event which is online and in a physical space, so if there are any hiccups, do please bear with us.
2. This means that on October 1st all ten open-mic spaces will be available to folk who are physically present at Asgard Games. Again, this is something we hope to be able to change as we learn what’s involved, and what tech we might need, but it’s baby steps for now.
3. We promise you great poetry, a range of voices, and a top night’s entertainment. Yes We Cant at Asgard will be just as good as ever. If you want a Zoom space, get in touch. If you’re coming along to the venue on the night, just turn up. And whichever you’re doing, please tell your friends. Thank you.

See you there!

best wishes
PPP

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PPP Poetry Competition Winners Announced

We’re pleased to announce the winners, shortlisted poets and commended poets in the PPP Poetry Competition 2023. The standard was exceptionally high and praise needs to go to everyone who submitted but particularly those who made the shortlist. All the details are on the competition webpage along with the top three poems.

On top of that we have raised a fantastic £851.77 to help support the work of The Good Shepherd in Wolverhampton.

Well done everyone.