BC youth who are 14–19 years old are eligible to compete so long as you are not on a team that is already registered in Hullabaloo. The top 4 highest-scoring poets in this slam will form the Wild Card Team and be automatically registered in the BC Youth Slam Championships. Francis Arevalo (2-time Youth Slam Team member) will be the feature poet.
The Spoken Word Jamboree kicks off the festival officially with feature poet Mary Pinkoski, the reigning Canadian Slam Champion. All teams will be invited to perform a one-minute intro poem to tell us more about themselves and their school and the evening will close with a showcase of team alternates.
This night will kick off the competitive section of Hullabaloo. Ostwelve from Beat Nation will warm up the crowd with a feature set in the beautiful rotunda of the Vancouver Art Gallery. Then everyone will move upstairs to the heritage courtrooms where we will hold four poetry slam bouts of four teams each.
By the second night of prelims, the tournament will be in full swing. Some teams will be flying high, others will be working hard to improve their ranking. Two-time Van Slam Indie Champ, Zaccheus Jackson will get the crowd hyped with a feature set and then everyone will move upstairs for the team bouts.
The top 12 poets from Hullabaloo prelims will run a gauntlet of poetic challenges to decide who will become the first-ever Hullabaloo Indie Champion. They will have to survive a Lightning Round and an Anarchy Round. Buddy Wakefield, 2-time Slam Champion and Write Bloody author, will make his return to Vancouver with a feature set.
Adventures in Poetryland is a series of workshops on the different aspects of spoken word poetry. You sign-up for the whole three-hour session, during which you'll circulate through a series of games, lessons, and exercises that will help you expand your poetic range and learn a whole lot more about how wide and varied the territory of poetryland is. These workshops are open to all BC Youth aged 14–19, but you must preregister.
The 2nd annual Hullabaloo Finals Night will determine which school has the best poetic chops in all of BC. Khary Jackson (2-time U.S. Slam Champion) will start the evening with a feature set of his award-winning spoken word poetry. Then, the top four teams – who have advanced through the preliminary and semi-final stages – will face off against each other with the 2012 Hullabaloo team championship at stake.
Floyd is the winner of the 1st ever Hullabaloo Individual Poetry Slam Championshipand a member of the South Delta Secondary 2012 Hullabaloo Championship Team as well as a 2012 Youth Slam Team Member. Jasmine Harvey is a member of the New West Minster Secondary team that finished 3rd in BC as well as being a part of the 2012 IGNITE Spoken Word mentorship program.
This will also be our first ever FAN APPRECIATION NIGHT as we give away prizes to audience members as well as judges and poets. A night of saying thank you for all the support we've been getting. There will also be a poetry open mic and poetry slam competition. There are two rounds in the slam so bring at least two poems to compete with.
It's all come down to this...after a full season that started back in August 2012 we have whittled it down to the top 8 youth slam poets who will be competing to make the next youth poetry slam team. The top 4 poets make the squad and will represent Vancouver and the very first Youth Can Slam National Youth Poetry Slam Competition.
The Spoken Word Jamboree kicks off the festival with feature poet Truth Is... All teams will be invited to perform a one-minute intro poem to tell us more about themselves and their school. The Jamboree provides all participating poets a chance to meet each other outside of a competition setting.