ron silliman & others at the text festival

Finally for now, although there are associated publications, and events in June to review later on, Ron Silliman, Claus van Bebber and guests performed yesterday. I apologise for posting this later than intended but it was only half finished when I went out to meet up with friends for lunch and then to Sounds from the Other City.

The performances began with Catriona Glover. I liked her piece although it wasn't quite clear what you were watching, how far it was complete invention, how far you were being invited to project interpretations into something quite slight, or whether there were allusions you were completely missing. I kept wondering how far the actual physical presentation was choreographed as well. I also realised outside that I'd seen some of her exhibited work outside the theatre space but not had much time to look at it. In part this is because it's quite discreet, almost hesitant or slipping out of view - some of it pretty well hidden. This is not to say there's anything diffident or unconfident about the work - more that it doesn't need to be in your face explaining what it's about at tedious length. I haven't seen any of her work before but it does repay attention. Geof Huth has a couple of good photographs of some of the work in the link from my previous post. I'd like to link to something with a decent amount of information about her work but I haven't been able to do so yet. I apologise and if I find anything I'll update. Do let me know if you have any links.

Then Hester Reeve performed. I'd already been baffled by her approaching me and others for our names, and hadn't told her mine, largely because I didn't know what was going on. I don't want to describe her performance because she may repeat it elsewhere and I don't want to give away what happens. For me, unfortunately, it didn't really work. Both this live piece and the piece in the Gallery left me uninterested. I'm not quite sure why, it may be that they're in the wrong context. I do feel that in both cases the apparent idea doesn't seem to warrant the length of each piece. I feel like there is no pay-off for the viewer once you've 'got' the concept. This is a shame because from the limited information available through her website her work looks really interesting.

Finally Claus van Bebber was the only one of the first section with whom I had some familiarity. He used two turntables and three records - two LPs and either a single or 10". The smaller record was placed on top of one of the LPs, and later switched to the other. He also used some kind of recording/sound manipulation gizmo that I couldn't see - it could have been as simple as a Digi-Delay I guess, but I suspect it was something more complex. He ran the records together, tweaking levels and speeds, and making use of surface noise, echo and reversing the records to generate effects from the downright sinister through volume and repetition to the apparently unaltered. He's performing next week as part of the Salford Concerts Series. I highly recommend him - check out Geof Huth's mini clip of his performance from my previous post and then have a look at some of the other bits of film it throws up.

After a brief break Ron Silliman appeared for his first UK reading ever, including apparently the world debut performance of a couple of the poems. Now before I get into the review, although there was a reasonable turnout to be perfectly honest I was disappointed at how few people were in the theatre. In a major metropolitan centre like Greater Manchester, with so many universities, creative writing courses, and so much poetry of all kinds happening it's a pretty sorry indictment of the state of poetry in Britain today that the place wasn't packed beyond capacity. For a poet of Ron's stature and visibility, making his UK debut at a major Text Festival, it's frankly embarrassing that there were any empty seats.

As already mentioned Ron started by taking photos of the audience 'In homage to Tony Lopez'. The physical set-up of the stage was the same as for The Bury Poems, although here the lectern made a lot of sense. Reading as he was from a copy of The Alphabet Ron clearly wouldn't have wanted to struggle about the stage with it. He read in a fluid way, not breaking up the poems. Despite them not being especially simple he didn't feel the need to linger over introductions, instead allowing the poems and the listener to do some of the work.

It was a reading I would have been happy to have gone on for a lot longer. I just felt that I was beginning to attune to the poems, and was beginning to get some idea of why the book needed to be so long, and of the kind of effect that it might have cumulatively. I have been saying for a while that The Alphabet and The Reality Street Book of Sonnets are top of my 'must buy' poetry list. One of the things that surprised me about the poems - although I don't know why this should be - was the very vivid sense of the physical world.

But honestly, you don't really expect me to summarise the work of thirty years from which tiny scattered fragments were read, in a soundbite after one listen do you? The performance was warm and relaxed even while the content was sometimes challenging, and while I still don't feel I've understood everything I heard. And don't take this as a criticism, I think it's good to be challenged. I especially like a reading where I come out not sure that I've wholly understood and where I want to read the poems to see whether I can wrestle some more sense out of them. 

Unfortunately, and much as I would love to, I won't be able to see Ron read at Birkbeck on Tuesday 5 May. But if you have the chance then you must take it. And regional pride be damned - see if you can't pack that venue way beyond capacity. I hope some of the talk and reading will be recorded so that those of us unable to attend can see what we missed.

As I said, there will be a few more Text Festival posts to come, but the main bulk of my posting is done for now. I'd really like to thank Tony Trehy and all the people who've helped him pull the festival together for bringing such a great event to Bury. I'd also like to express my gratitude for all the artists who took part and who've made it such a stimulating festival - especially thanks of course to Ron Silliman and Geof Huth for coming so far for such a relatively short period of time and somehow managing to be unfailing pleasant and polite despite what looked like a pretty hectic schedule. There are still a lot of events to come this summer - including my own part on The Other Room in June - but it'll be hard for any of them to match this experience.

Take care, and I'll be back soon.