Online Spoken Word Performance Coaching

Spoken Word Artists & Poetry Slam Competitors!

One of my favorite things to do is offer up coaching and advice to poetry performers preparing work for the stage, especially with regard to poetry slam competitions. My experience in poetic competition is unique and storied. I thought – since I am on a “very long hiatus” from competing for titles and monetary gain – why not help others in their pursuits?”

I know that I cannot be in every town at once, and there is nothing like the benefits of one-on-one coaching of spoken word performance, so I am offering a simple avenue to my services via the internet. If you have Skype and are in need of performance advice and critique from someone like me (or me specifically,) than this might be for you.

As you can see in this PayPal drop-down menu I have broken it up into three groups (if you cannot see the form, go here: http://www.mikemcgee.net/spoken-workshop

One-Hour Personal Performance Poetry Coaching By Mike McGee $100.00
On Skype, I will watch, critique and guide up to two (2) poems (or one group poem.) We can discuss anything about poetry slam, competitive strategy and the performances in question. I may – and usually do – advise toward some written editing of the poems.

Can be scheduled as two 30-minute sessions. Scheduling dates based on availability between 8:00am and midnight, Pacific Time.

When ordered, I will contact you with instructions and questions about scheduling. I will also request an electronic text copy of the poem(s).

Half-Hour Personal Performance Poetry Coaching By Mike McGee $40.00
On Skype, I will watch, critique and guide one (1) poem (NO group poems.) We can discuss anything about poetry slam, competitive strategy and the performances in question. I may – and usually do – advise toward some written editing of the poems.

Can be scheduled as two 30-minute sessions. Scheduling dates based on availability between 8:00am and midnight, Pacific Time.

When ordered, I will contact you with instructions and questions about scheduling. I will also request an electronic text copy of the poem(s).

Two Drafts of Poetry Editing By Mike McGee
I will read, edit, advise any one (1) poem, especially written for the stage. I will offer two rounds of edits and recommendations by email. You send me your poem, I edit it and send it back. You make edits, and accept or reject my edits, and send it back to me. I do one more round of editing to the poem and return it to you. We can discuss the poem over email.

BE SURE TO:
…have a solid internet connection
…commit to the work you will do
…schedule your time wisely with no interruptions
…have a goal in mind with your work
…be honest with me about your results
…use our time wisely during the workshop period (we can catch up another time)
…take notes

Once the workshops have been completed, there will be no refunds.

Purchase of personal workshop expires when we do.

Any questions? Gmail me: ilikemike

This entry was written by Mike McGee, posted on 8 June, 2011 at 12:49 PM, filed under Personal Updates and tagged online, performance, poetry, skype, workshop. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.

On the Internet

Over the last year, I’ve become very disgruntled with the amount people using useless and/or unnecessary social networking sites on the web. In November, I deleted my Myspace page, and other than the ability to message 4,000 people all at once, I have not missed much of it. I still run the T.O.F.U. (myspace.com/tonsoffununiversity) profile there, which I am trying to keep very simple.

Instead of hoarding people and sites, we should be evolving with the web. For example, the first social profile I created was at Friendster. It sucked over time, so I moved to Myspace in 2003, and now I’m at Facebook, which has learned a lot from the “growing suckage” of it’s predecessors. These predecessors are now learning from the new kids on the internet block; keeping up with the trend of quality usefulness and user-friendliness. Smart, that is.

However, I feel that when one does add themselves to a new community, they should pick one or two and stick with it. Each online community is very much like a house or a city, very few people live in more than one. It doesn’t seem logical.

By this, I figure I will leave Facebook once a better, more efficient networking portal comes along. It may exist already, but I would probably have to utilize my web-addiction a lot more to find it and develop yet another group of people I will always hardly know personally.

A good friend of mine has accounts and profiles registered on dozens of various social networking websites. I also know that this friend is annoyed with the amount maintenance needed to keep them updated, and eventually forgets about them, only to re-register as a new user. With me trying to be creative and maintain my touring schedule, I was falling behind on my Facebook and Myspace maintenance, so one of them had to go and I went with the lesser of two suckas.

My LiveJournal account has much more value to me than my Myspace profile ever did, which is why I’m keeping it. But now that I’ve “WordPress-ed” my site toward blog-friendliness, I am now reconsidering how I will use my LJ blog. I have considered using it as a Neat Links page, or as my gig listings. Not sure what I will do with it just yet.

I dig the web big time, but I certainly see the lack of much actual art/action stemming from being a member of any website or social network. I think there are a handful of people who have made their careers through web affiliation or promotion on some of these, but it seems to be a small handful of barely-skilled entertainers, and I believe it is a fleeting fame they are falling into. Over time, it’s a very small percentage of the world that actually cares about people who are famous for being famous. Fame in art is nice, but not necessary or primary. Art in fame would be nice to see.

Looking at the nature of shitty things on the net versus actual shitty things in the world and can I see that the web is a moving, growing tabloid of low-quality public interest and a broken amplifier of what the world really is and could become. The truest aspects of what counts in life can a should be found offline, on one’s own, then maybe one can research it online.

The internet is amazing. I certainly get most of my information from it, and have made more of a career through it, but I also tour a lot and perform many, many times a year in front of hundreds of thousands of people. That helps too. No matter how many people know you on the internet, one can never truly understand their own impact until they personally meet and greet the people they have or are impacting.

I feel like there needs to be better contact and context from artists online. If you have a growing fan base, stay in touch with them. Take the time to reach out and know your audience. I can learn from this philosophy too. I have really slipped in the last year with regard to keeping in touch with friends, fans and users. I am going to make a difference this year.

This entry was written by Mike McGee, posted on 27 January, 2008 at 4:59 PM, filed under Personal Updates and tagged facebook, Internet-Stuff, myspace, online, social networking, websites. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.