West Coast Team Poetry Slam
The Slam returns to Bumbershoot with a flair that most have not been privy to before. What could be better than performance poets bringing their “A” game to the stage? How about TEAMS of poets.
This slam features an All-star roster of teams battling each other to be the best in the West: Vancouver, BC; Seattle; Berkeley; and the Youth Speaks under-21 team from Seattle. Team slams feature multi-voiced pieces and take the poetic gymnastics to greater heights and can typically only be seen at national events - so don’t miss out!!!

For Tickets of more info on Bumbershoot: http://bumbershoot.org/tickets.htm

Seattle Poetry Slam Team

Seattle’s Poetry Slam Team this year is a mix of epic proportions: Ryler Dustin, ranked 8th at the World Poetry Slam and a 2x member of the Seattle Nat’l Slam Team; Tara Hardy, Bent Writing Institute founder, past Seattle Slam team member and coach and a former Poet Populist of Seattle; Angela Dy, finalist for Seattle’s Poet Populist and coach for three National Youth Slam Finalist teams; and Buddy Wakefield, two time Seattle Slam team member and two-time World Poetry Slam champion.
Check out some samples of their work on Myspace

Youth Speaks Seattle Team

Youth Speaks’ Team is: Dakota Camacho, Rose McAlese, Khatsini Simani, and Ronnie Rey. These young poets performed to an auditorium filled beyond its capacity at the Youth Speaks Grand Slam to earn their spots on this team. Currently ranked 5th in the nation, they come with passion, honesty, heart and razor edged tongues ready to spit fire.

For more information on this incredible team of youth poets and the organization helping them to find their voices check out their page on Myspace

Vancouver Poetry Slam Team

The Vancouver team is: Zaccheus Jackson, Scrufmouth, Fernando Raguero and Nora Smithhisler. Coming to us from across the border in beautiful British Columbia, this groups of poets mix up poetic styles from hip-hop inspired thoughts on the world’s current political landscape to Bukowski-esque peeks into the way we live our lives. They bring quirk, wit, fun and are ready to bump and shoot at Bumbershoot.

Check out our poetic neighbors in Canada at their page on Myspace

Berkeley Poetry Slam Team

Traveling the farthest to join in the competition is the team from Berkeley, California.
Berkeley has a long standing history of forging extraordinary teams of poets. This year’s team is D.Silence, Joshua Walters, Christian Drake, Isaac Miller, and Jamie De Wolf.

The all male team brings a variety of experience including a World Indi Finalist, a National Head-To-Head Haiku Champ, the SF Youth Champ, and incredible performance and a slew of team pieces. Expect humor, tragedy, anthemic work, and deep pockets full of the unexpected.

Find more info on the Berkeley Slam on their webpage