Uncorked Performance Poetry Night At Bottles Wine Bar, Worcester

As an avid poetry writer and reader in my spare time, I was absolutely over the moon to see a new performance poetry event pop up on Facebook called “Uncorked” which was to take place at Bottles Wine Bar in Worcester. Even better is that it was organised by a lovely lady called Holly Daffurn. I first had the pleasure of meeting Holly when I was Chair of the Worcester Music Festival way back in 2009, and she used to put on some lovely live music nights by the name of “Llama Lounge”. Her Dad is also a lovely chap who is in a band called “Ghandi’s Walrus”, and having not seen her for a while I was pleasantly surprised to see that she has become a well-known performance poet, and has taken part in many spoken word events as well as being involved with Apples and Snakes. Way to go Holly!

I got my tickets at the beginning of last week and tentatively took the plunge to email Holly and ask if there were any open mic slots available, although I guessed that there wouldn’t be. Sure enough they were all taken, but I went to the event with my friend Sylvia Herbert after a long hiatus of going to spoken word events.

It was such a refreshing change to see some new, vibrant and different people performing at this event. One thing I’ve noticed is that most spoken word events can and do become a bit “same old same old” with – as the Emperor Nero said in the film Quo Vadis, “the same faces, same noses”, but Holly managed to attract poets from all over the area, and even from as far as Birmingham and Swindon.

Around the open mic performers which included Ric Sanders, Lesley Daffurn (I particularly enjoyed her poem about “Knickers”, as well as the ever-present Maggie Doyle and the always wonderful Mike Alma, Holly had booked no less than four headliners – Casey Bailey, Joe Cook, Jasmine Gardosi and Leon Priestnall. Out of the headliners my favourites were Joe and Leon, they quite literally stole the show for me, and Joe’s poem about dyslexia has even been featured on BBC Arts – http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p047lvjw.

As I know to my detriment, putting on a new event is always fraught with much anxiety but Holly pulled this off with ease and has created something wonderful that I hope will continue, as I will definitely be going as long as I can make future dates. Sadly I had to leave before the end as my friend had been to the dentist in the afternoon and wasn’t feeling well from the experience, but next time I will ensure I can stay until the last poet has uttered their final word.

For more information about forthcoming “Uncorked” events, visit https://www.facebook.com/uncorkedspokenwordnight/.