Brave New Voices

Brave New Voices ^[1] was created by Youth Speaks Inc ^[2] in 1998 (a non-profit organization from San Francisco promoting youth intellectual and artistic self-development) after the inaugural Youth Speaks Teen slam poetry in San Francisco – the first poetry slam dedicated to youth in the world. Since that time, Brave New Voices has grown to represent youth ages 13-19 from all across the United States and several cities and countries from around the world. BNV is the largest ongoing spoken word event in the world.^[3] Cities compose teams of their top 4-6 youth poets to bring to the festival. When the festival began only four teams participated, but the competition has grown to over 50 participating teams.

The final contestants are judged by a jury composed of artistic personnalities. In 2010, the jury was composed by the illusionist and TV host Penn Jillette, poets Mayda Del Valle and Beau Sia, musician Talib Kweli and actress Sanaa Lathan.^[4][5]

The finale of Brave New Voices in 2008 and 2010 is aired on HBO.

HBO Presents Brave New Voices

For the last few years, James Kass, Bamuthi and others have been working with Stan Lathan on making sure that young people were booked onto HBO’s Def Poetry. When Russell Simmons and Stan first launched Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, they tried it out in SF, and saw the incredible audiences and talents there. Further, for the last few years, James, Bamuthi and others have been pitching the idea of the Brave New Voices series throughout Hollywood, and Stan Lathan agreed to make it happen. He brought it to HBO – which is the perfect place, as we didn’t have to censor the youth.

This project helps to raise the visibility of youth voices, giving them a national platform on a network that will not censor or stereotype them It also raises the visibility of the work of Youth Speaks and the youth spoken word movement as a whole. The show shows a slice of the work we’ve been doing and the movement hat we’ve helped grow. Our hope is that this show will allow us to begin to generate the attention and resources we need to sustain the work – locally in the bay, and nationally.

Youth Speaks has been working with HBO’s Def Poetry for a few years, but the 2008 docu-series was the first direct relationship Youth Speaks has had with HBO. HBO provided some corporate support of the 2008 and 2010 Brave New Voices Festival. The TV series hast three main partners – Youth Speaks, Simmons-Lathan Media Group, and HBO. HBO is interested in continuing the partnership down the road.

Smaller Competitions Within Brave New Voices

During the Brave New Voices festival every year smaller, specific competitions are held that are open to all participants in the larger festival. To date there are three of these types of competitions: Speak Green, MC Olympics, and the Individual Poetry Slam. Winners of these competitions are often highlighted during the festival and given other performance opportunities outside of the festival.

Speak Green

Started in 2007, Speak Green is a competition where participants write and perform poems about the environment and environmental justice. This is a product of collaboration between Youth Speaks and the Robert Redford Sundance Institute. The top poets from this competition then form the Green Team. Past members of the Green Team have been able to perform at the Sundance Film Festival, the US Green Build conference and the Kennedy Center^[6] James Redford, son of Robert Redford who is a sponsor of Speak Green, has spoken publicly about the Green Team's efforts: "Artists like the Green Team poets have the power to remind us of the power of our own humanity. By taking something as broad as climate change, and running it through the prism of personal experience and artistic expression, well, what emerges are stories of undeniable honesty and power, stories that can inspire commitments to action, solutions, and change." ^[7]

MC Olympics

In 2009, Youth Speaks and Young Chicago Authors created the MC Olympics "as a model to engage rappers in the poet community". The competition is open to all participants of Brave New Voices and each phase of the competition focuses on a certain style or technique of rapping such as freestyling and written verses.^[8] The winner of the competition each year is awarded a champion belt similar to those seen in wrestling.

Team Finalists

MC Olympic Champions

Individual Poetry Slam Champion

References

External links

• Official website
• Brave New Voices on HBO