We’re over the moon to have partnered with Roundhouse to co-produce a regional heat as part of the 2024 Roundhouse Poetry Slam.
This competition is one of the most prestigious events on the annual poetry calendar. It offers poets aged 18-25 the opportunity to compete for a cash prize, as well as the coveted title of Slam Champion.
Hundreds of poets around the UK have applied to compete, and on Monday 29 April, we’re hosting a regional heat at Hyde Park Book Club in Leeds.
The judging panel consists of three highly-acclaimed poets, all whom count the Roundhouse Poetry Slam as being transformative in their earlier years: Vanessa Kisuule, Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan, and Maria Ferguson!
The evening will be hosted by Matt Abbott and tickets are available here for £5, plus a small booking fee.
Thanks to our funding from Arts Council England, we’re in a position to be able to offer two freelance job opportunities. We’re excited to gradually expand the LIVEwire Poetry team and to grow the organisation in fresh and dynamic ways.
Admin & Social Assistant
Freelance Opportunity | Admin & Social Assistant
We’re looking for somebody to assist with ongoing admin work and also to provide support with our social media output. Initially, we can only guarantee this role until the end of June, although we are hoping to extend that until the end of 2024.
This would involve starting your role almost immediately. Once we’ve shortlisted applicants on 8 March, we’ll aim to interview candidates and have somebody in place the following week. Please send us a cover letter and a basic CV, plus any questions that you might have, to hello@livewirepoetry.org.
Videographer call-out
Job Opportunity | Videographer
We’re looking for somebody to capture our dynamic live poetry events in a professional and engaging style. Our key requirements are a short highlight video (approx. 90-120 seconds) and a selection of stills (approx. 10-12) per event.
However, we’re open to this being a creative collaboration – we’re keen to hear inventive and original styles that can generate exciting content for our channels. This could be a fantastic way to boost your showreel and gain new contacts.
We’re open to this being a flexible opportunity – you don’t need to be available for all 8 dates. Just let us know which you’re interested in and we’ll go from there. Please email us a cover letter and basic CV, plus any questions that you might have, to hello@livewirepoetry.org.
Both of these roles are remote, but you must be based in the UK.
Calling poets and spoken word artists aged 18-25! Apply to compete in Roundhouse Poetry Slam in partnership with Taylor Wessing, for the chance to perform at regional heats and a final at Roundhouse for the title of Slam Champion. Apply online by Fri 1 March, 9am – click here.
The Roundhouse Poetry Slam is one of the most iconic annual events on the UK poetry scene. And we’re over the moon about the fact that, for the first time ever, the iconic slam is staging regional heats in Leeds.
And not only that – Roundhouse have partnered with LIVEwire to produce it.
Applications are accepted UK-wide, and applicants are then assigned a regional heat. The other heats are in Liverpool, Bristol, and London, so… quite a few people will qualify for the Leeds heat. Get applying!
If you want to join us at Hyde Park Book Club to watch the slammers in action, the regional heat takes place on Monday 29 April and tickets are available here for £5 plus booking fee.
The judging team is a trio of phenomenal poets: Vanessa Kisuule, Maria Ferguson, and Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan! Matt Abbott will be on hosting duties.
It was at The Edge Theatre & Arts Centre where the first-ever LIVEwire tour kicked off, way back in September 2019. The tour was never completed – it was due to run until spring 2020 – but those earlier dates in Manchester, Bristol, Birmingham, and Leeds were a real turning point for Nymphs & Thugs.
We returned to The Edge for a one-off event in November 2021, and we’re delighted to be launching our LIVEwire regional dates in the form of this brand-new organisation. It’s a wonderful venue and we’ve programmed a spectacular line-up of poets who start us off as we mean to go on.
LIVEwire Manchester at The Edge Theatre & Arts Centre on 14 March
Join us on Thursday 14 March for electric performances from Momtaza Mehri, Jess Green, and Casey Bailey! Tickets are available here for £15 (£13) and we expect that it’ll sell out – the first two LIVEwire Manchester events did just that.
Momtaza Mehri is an award-winning poet and essayist. She is a former Young People’s Poet Laureate for London and winner of the 2019 Manchester Writing Prize. Momtaza won the 2023 Forward Prize for Best First Collection with ‘Bad Diaspora Poems’.
BBC Slam Champion, Jess Green is a performance poet and script writer for. She’s performed at Glastonbury, Latitude and BBC 6 Music Festival as well as having taken two 5* shows to Edinburgh Fringe and on national tours. Her new poetry collection ‘Dressed As Love’ was published in December.
Casey Bailey was Birmingham’s Poet Laureate 2020–22. His second collection ‘Please Do Not Touch’ was published in 2021 and his debut play ‘GrimeBoy’ had a sold out run at Birmingham Rep in 2022. He is a Fellow of the Uni of Worcester and in 2021 was awarded an honorary doctorate by Newman Uni.
If you’re curious as to what you can expect, the wonderful Northern Heart Films produced this highlights reel of our 2019 event below.
LIVEwire Manchester No.1, which took place in September 2019
The world needs more poetry. I think that’s plain for all to see. It can’t cure the world’s gravest ills but as human beings, it’s the connection, understanding, validation, and escapism, that keeps us going day by day.
So, we’re over the moon to introduce LIVEwire: a brand-new poetry organisation. Our aim is to specialise in live events and writer development, with poetry at the centre of everything that we do.
This new organisation has evolved from Nymphs & Thugs – an independent spoken word record label established in 2015, which has grown into a world leader in its field. N&T still exist as a record label, belonging to LIVEwire, and you can check out our releases here.
LIVEwire Manchester at The Edge Theatre & Arts Centre on 14 March
As with N&T, LIVEwire will be driven by poet and educator Matt Abbott, with support from cultural entrepreneur Jack Simpson as a Director. We also welcome acclaimed poet and performer Maria Ferguson as Assistant Producer, and have a small number of freelancers providing specialised support.
This first phase of this project, running until June, has been mainly funded by Arts Council England. It includes live events in Leeds, Manchester, and Weston-super-Mare. It also includes workshop serries in Huddersfield, Blackburn, Clevedon, and online.
The workshop series will culminate in an online sharing event and zine launch in June. All of our workshops are open to all, but are specifically targeted at writers who identify as working-class, or as coming from a working-class background. Accessibility is at the heart of what we do and we want to champion poets from all walks of life.
Roundouse Poetry Slam regional heat at Hyde Park Book Club on 29 April
Also, if you have any PR enquiries or you’re a partner venue interested in hosting a LIVEwire event, please contact Matt Abbott on matt@livewirepoetry.org.
LIVEwire Poetry 