| As a musician in NY, You are bound to go to a million open mic's, and sorry to hurt everyone's feelings, but you will see a lot of times the same kinds of performers. However, there are some hosts and venues who have recognized this, and want a change; And Dale Novella is one of them. Dale is a songwriter/ performer who was influenced to start the open mic series "The Poet Will Be Televised" series with the poem "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" By Gil Scott-Heron, an important poet in the civil rights movement of the 60's and 70's. When Crystalla and I walked into room 1 (which was packed with at least 40 people) we came in just at start of an intense MC's performance; And this MC goes by the name of Johnny Hobes (www.johnnyhobbes.com). One quote that caught my attention was "The universe is a hologram, follow your heart. If you want to get to the promised land". Johnny's style in my opinion is a perfect marriage of witty rap and spiritual poetry. The beat that he rapped over was the greatest improvised funky version of the fifth symphony's I've ever heard. Which was played by the house band of the night containing Keyboardist Simone Acosta, Guitarist played Marques Durieux and Drummer Jeremy Warren. After Johnny Hobbes came the funny and majestic host Baxter Wordsworth. This guy had me cracking up. Up next was Hiiim Ozell. He freestyled a poem about self examination in regards to insecurity and negativity. One of his lines mentioned "I'm not looking for a free ride. I can't free myself if I can't ride". He ended his poem saying "Let your heart be open, don't let this life leave you broken". After that came Tatiana Kalko https://soundcloud.com/kalkomusic who performed a Poem about long distance relationship and a Poem about not wanting to meet an attractive man. One of her lines were "I carry your weightless body around the room". She then performed a song with a guitar (borrowed from Marcus) containing a folky jazz chord progression. This song discussed the issues of betrayal or miscommunication in a relationship. "How could you my friend, how you could my love" was the Chorus. Then Marques, (an old friend from my guitar center days ) goes up and plays a smooth jazz ballad, with a smooth coffee voice " if I told you it was love would you give it a try". His other song, a freestyle poem called "whatever" "your sick of your 9-5 want to live another life". I thought that was a pretty rad rap! And then came Leon Marin www.leonmarin.com who tore down the house! His first rap discussed the topic of bullying."I got problems and I don't really know how to solve them". His second song, (performed with the band) he put on a church choir uniform which made the crowd go wild. He went on to do a 15 minute freestyle. He is an energetic performer indeed. Then the end the night came with Joi Sanchez aka J The GodIs:. She performed a spoken word/song about self respect, doesn't want to lower her self esteem or Worth just for sex. She sung a Chorus stating "everyday I wake up a little stronger." It really lifted my spirit. Like I said before, I've been to a million open mic's. But trust me when I tell you that this one is different. I think is has to do with the combination of music and poetry, which offers a balance of entertainment. Some open mic's simply don't have this balance. But this one did. And what was even better was how young the crowd was. Which is dispelling the stereo type that people in their 20's just want to get wasted at a bar somewhere. Loved this open mic. The next The Poet will be Televised is March 11th from 8:15 pm to 11pm featuring Maya Osbourne and Naajidah Correll for Women's month! I encourage you to attend! Written By Gabriel Castellar Photos By Crystalla Gonzalez |