The Single Onion

2012 Lecture Series, Part Two

2012-01-23T19:21:00.000-08:00

WHAT: The Present of Poetics, the Poetics of the Present

WHEN: Thursday, February 9th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9^th Ave SE

How does poetry respond to the current moment? In a time of increasingly global economic disparity, ecological disaster, and seemingly endless social and political challenges, poets note and record the era. How they do so remains a matter for discussion -- as well as a very fertile terrain for aesthetics. This event, curated by Mount Royal University's Kit Dobson, features Rita Wong, Rachel Zolf, and Sharron Proulx-Turner.

About the participants:

Kit Dobson specializes in Canadian literature and globalization studies. After growing up in Calgary, Kit studied at the universities of Victoria, York (UK), and Toronto before joining Mount Royal University. His first book, Transnational Canadas: Anglo-Canadian Literature and Globalization, was published in 2009 by Wilfrid Laurier University Press. His teaching interests include twentieth-century and contemporary Canadian literature, film studies, and writing.

Rita Wong is the author of three books of poetry: sybil unrest (co-written with Larissa Lai, Line Books, 2008), forage (Nightwood 2007), and monkeypuzzle (Press Gang 1998). forage won Canada Reads Poetry 2011. Wong received the Asian Canadian Writers Workshop Emerging Writer Award in 1997, and the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize in 2008. An Associate Professor in Critical + Cultural Studies at the Emily Carr University of Art + Design, she has developed a humanities course focused on water, for which she received a fellowship from the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society. She is currently researching the poetics of water with the support of a SSHRC Research/Creation grant.

Rachel Zolf is a poet and editor from Toronto who is presently living in New York. Her third full-length collection Human Resources won the 2008 Trillium Book Award for Poetry and was a finalist for a Lambda Award. Previous collections include Shoot & Weep (Nomados), Human Resources (Belladonna books), Masque (The Mercury Press) and Her absence, this wanderer (BuschekBooks).

Sharron Proulx-Turner is a member of the Métis Nation of Alberta. Originally from the Ottawa river valley, she’s from Mohawk, Algonquin, Wyandot, Ojibwe, Mi’kmaw, French, Scottish and Irish ancestry. Her previously published memoir, Where the Rivers Join (1995), written under a pseudonym, was a finalist for the Edna Staebler award for creative non-fiction, and her second book, what the auntys say (2002), was a finalist for the League of Canadian Poets’ Gerald Lampert Prize for best first book of poetry. Sharron’s work appears in several anthologies and journals. Her latest book, she walks for days/ inside a thousand eyes/ (a two-spirit story), was released by Turnstone press.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

2012 Lecture Series - Part One

2012-01-04T19:29:00.000-08:00

With the Support of Calgary Arts Development, Single Onion is proud to present the 2012 Single Onion Lecture Series. The Lecture Series is a three part program, featuring three critical poetry topics with entertainment and enlightenment.

SINGLE ONION #90 – LECTURE SERIES (Part I of III)

WHAT: Reckless Enchantment: The Art of Poetic Charge

WHEN: Thursday, January 19th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9^th Ave SE

COST: FREE!

The event will feature an introductory lecture by Jeramy Dodds, the current Writer-in-Residence at the University of Calgary, followed by featured poet Joshua Trotter and two other acclaimed poets.

The Participants:

Jeramy Dodds grew up in Orono, Ontario. His first book, Crabwise to the Hounds (Coach House, 2008) was shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize and won the Trillium Book Award for Poetry. He is currently the Canadian writer-in-residence of the Calgary Distinguished Writers Program.

Brecken Hancock is a poet and essayist originally from Saskatchewan. Her work has appeared in Grain, CV2, The Fiddlehead, PRISM, Arc, and Studies in Canadian Literature. Over the past two years, she's lived in Kyoto, Japan and Reykjavik, Iceland; but she's also been home to hold an artist's residency at The Bruno Arts Bank, a converted historical building in rural Saskatchewan. Her chapbook Strung appeared with JackPine Press and she's currently finishing her first full-length manuscript of poems, Broom Broom.

Sandy Pool is a poet and multi-disciplinary artist who lives in Calgary. Sandy holds a degree in Theatre Performance and English from the University of Toronto, as well as a Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University Guelph. Currently, she is a doctoral student at the University of Calgary, where she is the editor of Dandelion Magazine. Sandy has been published in various international literary journals and was most recently anthologized in The Best Canadian Poems in 2011, published by Tightrope Books. Her first book Exploding Into Night published by Guernica Editions, was recently longlisted for the 2010 re-lit award and short-listed for the 2010 Governor General’s Award for poetry. Sandy also works as a librettist and voice work artist, and is the Writer-In- Residence at Tapestry New Opera Works.

Joshua Trotter lives and cooks in Montreal. All This Could Be Yours is his first book.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A Special Event at Pages Books

2011-12-13T11:43:00.000-08:00

Pages Books & Frontenac House

invite you to celebrate:

In This Place

Calgary 2004 - 2011

Photographs by George Webber

Words by Aritha van Herk

7:30, Friday, December 16, 2011

Pages on Kensington

1135 Kensington Road NW

(403) 283-6655

November Onions

2011-10-27T11:36:00.000-07:00

WHAT: The Single Onion reading series presents an evening of poetry with Vivian Hansen. The featured readings will be preceded by an open mic. Please come early to sign up if you are interested in reading for the open mic.

WHEN: Thursday, November 17th, at 7:30 p.m.

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

COST: FREE!

About the Reader:

Vivian Hansen is a Calgary poet and activist. She has run poetry workshops for the John Howard Society/Inn From the Cold Literacy initiatives. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in many anthologies, most recently in The Madwoman in the Academy and Writing the Terrain. She has recently edited a collection of poetry entitled Rubbing-Stone: A Nose Hill Anthology, to be published by Passwords Enterprises in 2012. Her chapbook of poetry Never Call It Bird: the Melodies of Aids came out in 1998. Her first full-length book of poetry Leylines of My Flesh was published by Touchwood Press in 2002. In 2004, she published Angel Alley, a chapbook about the victims of Jack the Ripper. She has just completed her MFA in Creative Writing with the University of British Columbia.

Single Onion happens the third Thursday of the month, ten times a year. Our event schedule can always be found at: http://thesingleonion.blogspot.com

For the most up to date Single Onion news check us out on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/singleonion

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

Apologetic for Joy - Calgary Launch

2011-10-01T11:07:00.000-07:00

WHAT: The Single Onion reading series presents an evening of poetry with Jessica Hiemstra-van der Horst. The featured readings will be preceded by an open mic. Please come early to sign up if you are interested in reading for the open mic.

WHEN: Thursday, October 20th, at 7:30 p.m.

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

COST: FREE!

About the Reader:

Jessica Hiemstra-van der Horst is a visual artist and writer. Her work has appeared in several Canadian journals, including Descant, Room, Arc, and The Malahat Review. Her poems have also been anthologized in Approaches to Poetry: the pre-poem moment.

Her first book of poems, Apologetic for Joy, is a lush collection from a unique new voice whose palette of subject matter ranges from artistic anatomy to dislocation. Hiemstra-van der Horst's poems reveal a sensual awareness and an imaginative escape into intricately woven poetic worlds, rich in sensual detail and metaphor. Her gentler sketches of quotidian moments peel away to reveal an artist and poet whose careful observations of the world undertake the difficult translation to page and canvas.

"‘No one,’ Jessica Hiemstra van-der Host claims, ‘has ‘the reins on radiance,' but she is a poet stepping into the sun, wielding a magnifying glass. Her voice is a beam that sings and dazzles, and these are poems to set heart ablaze." — Sachiko Murakami, author of The Invisibility Exhibit

Single Onion happens the third Thursday of the month, ten times a year. Our event schedule can always be found at: http://thesingleonion.blogspot.com

For the most up to date Single Onion news check us out on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/singleonion

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

100 Poets!

2011-08-30T12:06:00.000-07:00

2011 Calgary Spoken Word Society & Single Onion

100 Poets for Change

The Calgary Spoken Word Society & Single Onion come together

to present the first annual 100 Poets for Change event in Calgary.

100 Poets for Change is a worldwide event on September 24th, uniting artists and poets in a simultaneous celebration to promote social, environmental and political change.

The idea is purposefully broad – each community touching on their own local issues. Encouraging people to get out and meet their neighbors in times of ever-growing alienation. Come out and change how you see your local and global community!

Join us at the Bassbuss at Riley Park

On September 24^th from 1:00pm to 3:00pm

Guest Readers and Open Mic

100 Poets for Change is happening in cities all over the world (around 60 countries so far) on September 24th please visit http://www.100tpc.org/

Thanks to Michael Rothenberg for spearheading this project on the much larger scale. Here's what he has to say about 100 Thousand Poets for Change on the universal event page he created at http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=106999432715571

The first order of change is for poets, writers, artists, anybody, to actually get together to create and perform, educate and demonstrate, simultaneously, with other communities around the world. This will change how we see our local community and the global community. We have all become incredibly alienated in recent years. We hardly know our neighbors down the street let alone our creative allies who live and share our concerns in other countries. We need to feel this kind of global solidarity. I think it will be empowering.

And of course there is the political/social change that many of us are talking about these days. There is trouble in the world. Wars, ecocide, the lack of affordable medical care, racism, the list goes on. It appears that transformation towards a more sustainable world is a major concern and could be a global guiding principle for this event. Peace also seems to be a common cause. War is not sustainable. There is an increasing sense that we need to move forward and stop moving backwards. But I am trying not to be dogmatic. I am hoping that together we can develop our ideas of the "change/transformation" we are looking for as a group, and that each community group will decide their own specific area of focus for change for their particular event.

Our Fall Kickoff Event

2011-08-23T07:12:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion reading series presents an evening of poetry with Lorna Crozier, Kirk Ramdath, and Midnight Yoga for Alcoholics. The featured readings will be preceded by an open mic. Please come early to sign up if are interested in reading for the open mic. This event kicks off the exciting fall season.

WHEN: Thursday, September 15th, at 7:30 p.m.

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

About the Readers:

Lorna Crozier was born in 1948 in Swift Current, Saskatchewan. As a child growing up in a prairie community where the local heroes were hockey players and curlers, she “never once thought of being a writer.” After university, Lorna went on to teach high school English and work as a guidance counsellor. During these years, Lorna published her first poem in Grain magazine, a publication that turned her life toward writing. Her first collection, Inside in the Sky, was published in 1976. Since then, she has authored 14 books of poetry, including The Garden Going on Without Us, Angels of Flesh, Angels of Silence, Inventing the Hawk (winner of the 1992 Governor-General’s Award), Everything Arrives at the Light, Apocrypha of Light, What the Living Won’t Let Go, and most recently Small Mechanics. Whether Lorna is writing about angels, aging, or Louis Armstrong’s trout sandwich, she continues to engage readers and writers across Canada and the world with her grace, wisdom and wit. She is, as Margaret Laurence wrote, “a poet to be grateful for.”

Kirk Ramdath is a mainstay among Calgary’s poets and spoken-word artists. His “Passion Pitch” poetry series has brought together a wide range of writers to share their words and music, drinks and discussion in an era when the open mic reading, so fertile a ground for many writers practicing today, has been abandoned. He has organized poetry-in-the-park readings, as well as some of the readings in the Single Onion series. Kirk’s poetry has appeared in chapbooks, journals, and on stage – he was one of the first readers in the Calgary Spoken-Word Festival’s “Smart Men, Hot Words” readings. His poetry is noted, appropriately, given the reading series he founded, for its passion and sensuality. His first collection, Love in a Handful of Dust, was published this spring by Frontenac House.

Midnight Yoga for Alcoholics (Kirk Miles & Ken Sinclair): To enrol for classes take these three simple steps. Step One: Grab a back-porch gut-bucket of blues – the kind that creeps out of the Mississippi delta like a snake-tongued slide guitar. The label should read old-school and include equal chunks of stone hoodoo, nightshade, and ghost trains. Step Two: Into the bucket, blend the modern cadences of incisive spoken word. Make sure that you can taste the city. Step Three (How to serve): Garnish with a jazzed penny whistle. Age for at least five decades and serve cold. You are now enrolled in sound fusion. You are making the culture with words. As old as the poet and as new as the microphone.

A Special Onion Event: Winewords

2011-08-16T07:50:00.001-07:00

Lost for language to describe your wine? J Webb Wine Merchant and Single Onion Reading Series present: Winewords, and evening of innovative wine tasting coupled with poetry performance. Five uncorked Calgary poets will each be paired with a wine and balance a reading with their nose and palate. Appetizers provided by Cassis Bistro.

WHEN: Thursday, September 22nd, at 8:00 PM

WHERE: J Webb Wine Merchant, 2507 17th Ave. SW

TICKETS: $20, visit J Webb or call 403-685-5218 (ticket includes wine, poetry and food)

POETS: Cecelia Frey, Julie Sedivy, Andre Rodrigues, Erin Dingle, and Midnight Yoga for Alcoholics

About the Poets:

Cecelia Frey was born in northern Alberta, grew up in Edmonton and now lives in Calgary. She studied at the University of Alberta and, after raising a family, returned to the University of Calgary where she completed an M.A. in English. Cecelia has worked as an editor, teacher and freelance writer and has long been involved in the Calgary literary community. Her short stories and poetry have been published in dozens of journals and anthologies as well as being broadcast on CBC radio and performed on the Woman’s Television Network. Her numerous reviews, essays, and articles have appeared in a wide range of publications including newspapers such as The Calgary Herald and The Globe and Mail and journals as varied as Westword and Canadian Literature.

Julie Sedivy was born in the Czech Republic and descends directly from a venerable line of peasants, intellectuals, political dissidents and Catholic priests. She is a dissector of language: She holds a Ph.D. in Linguistics and has spent more than twenty years as a language scientist, having taught at Brown University in the U.S. and now at the University of Calgary where she teaches courses about language and persuasion. She is the lead author of the recently-published book Sold on Language: How Advertisers Talk to You and What This Says About You. She blogs regularly for Psychology Today and for Language Log, the favourite blog of language geeks everywhere. In her poems, Julie Sedivy provokes questions about the collisions and intertwinings between the religious and the secular, between belief and science.

Andre Rodrigues (in his own words): “we are eskimo-mo-mo. oh here we go. this is how we roll-roll-roll. this is how we row-row-row-ho-ho-ho-ho. there's nothing to it. it's kinda easy, kinda breezy, to glide like us-us-us-us. to slide like us-us-us-us. just do it. trust your inner inuit-it-it-it.”

Erin Dingle is an emerging Spoken Word Poet in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. She won the Calgary Poetry Slam in November 2010. She was also a part of the 2011 International Spoken Word Program in Banff, Canada. Erin is a mistress of wordplay, deconstructed rhymes and rhythms. She addresses personal and public issues with fierce honesty and a sharp, sarcastic wit. Erin's first chapbook is titled "Static." Check out her blog at digitaldingle.wordpress.com.

Midnight Yoga for Alcoholics (Kirk Miles & Ken Sinclair) To enrol for classes take these three simple steps. Step One: Grab a back porch gut-bucket of blues. The kind that creeps out of the Mississippi delta like a snake tongued slide guitar. The label should read old school and include equal chunks of stone hoodoo, nightshade, and ghost trains. Step Two: In to the bucket blend in the modern cadences of incisive spoken word. Make sure that you can taste the city. Step Three (How to serve): Garnish with a jazzed penny whistle. Age for at least five decades and serve cold. You are now enrolled in sound fusion. You are making the culture with words. As old as the poet and as new as the microphone.

J. Webb Wine Merchant is proud to deal with some of the best wineries in the world. We carefully select each wine we carry to ensure that it is an exquisite item. We have one of the largest selections of imported wines from around the world, from some of the best, award-winning wineries. For more information and location details, visit: www.jwebb.net.

Cassis Bistro creates and serves authentic dishes inspired by the south of France and created with local, seasonal produce, hand-selected daily from Market 17 next door. French and Canadian wines from J.Webb Wines are carefully chosen to pair perfectly with Cassis Bistro's approachable, delicious food – dishes you will crave as soon as you leave. Warm, friendly service grounded in passion, not just for food and wine, but for nourishing people in all ways. Visit the menu at: www.thecassisbistro.ca.

Onion Wrap

2011-06-01T08:52:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion reading series presents an evening of poetry with Dave Margoshes, Rosemary Griebel, and Erin Dingle. The featured readings will be preceded by an open mic. Please come early to sign up if you are interested in reading for the open mic. This event will close off the spring season. Single Onion will return in September.

WHEN: Thursday, June 16th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

COST: FREE!

About the Readers:

Dave Margoshes is a Saskatoon-area writer (and former Calgarian) whose work has appeared widely in Canadian literary magazines and anthologies, including six times in the Best Canadian Stories volumes. He’s published over a dozen books, including Dimensions of an Orchard, which won the Saskatchewan Book Awards’ Poetry Prize last year. His Bix’s Trumpet and Other Stories won two prizes at the 2007 Saskatchewan Book Awards, including Book of the Year. He won the Stephen Leacock Prize for Poetry in 1996, and was a finalist for the Journey Prize, Canada’s premier short story award, in 2009. He’s a former fiction editor for Calgary’s Dandelion magazine, in an earlier incarnation.

Rosemary Griebel is a librarian and board member of the Writer’s Guild of Alberta. Her award-winning poetry has appeared in The Best Canadian Poetry in English 2010, literary magazines, anthologies and chapbooks, public buses and on CBC Radio. Her first collection of poetry, Yes, was published by Frontenac House in 2011.

Erin Dingle is an emerging Spoken Word Poet in Calgary. She won the Calgary Poetry Slam in November, 2010. She was also a participant the 2011 International Spoken Word Program in Banff, Canada. Erin's first chapbook is titled "Static." You can find samples of her work here.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A very special thanks to Paul Marshall for the SO85 poster art.

Highlights from Single Onion #84

2011-05-24T09:06:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos courtesy of James Tworow. You can discover more of his work by clicking here.

Betsy Warland

Stuart Ian McKay

David Martin

May Onions

2011-04-29T07:52:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion presents an evening of poetry with Betsy Warland, Stuart Ian McKay, and David Martin, plus an open mic. Get there early to sign up for your five minutes of fame!

WHEN: Thursday, May 19, at 7:30 p.m.

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 - 9th Ave SE

COST: FREE!

About the Readers:

Betsy Warland has published 11 books of poetry and creative nonfiction. Vancouver, B.C., is home. Although most known as a poet, Warland defies categorization. She is a writer of the between, working in extended narratives that employ different genres and blended genres. Creative nonfiction gatekeepers see her work as poetry; poetry gatekeepers see her work as creative nonfiction. Several of her What Holds Us Here suites of poems on various forms of longing have become song lyrics. Her 2005 book, only this blue, features a long poem and an essay on the form of poetry, “Nose to Nose.” Warland’s acclaimed 2010 book, Breathing the Page: Reading the Act of Writing, is a collection of essays and short texts on the writing materials with which we write (table, computer, page, alphabet), and on the forces we encounter, when writing, that lie beneath the language of craft. She will be reading from her lyric prose work-in-progress, “Oscar of Between.”

Stuart Ian McKay is a member of the Writers Guild of Alberta and the League of Canadian Poets. Stele of Several Ladies – a long poem, his first book, was published in 2005. He is a two-time winner of CBC's Alberta Anthology. He lives in Calgary. He will be reading from "a cognate of prayer,” a recently completed manuscript, and from works in progress.

David Martin is a writer and teacher in Calgary. His poems have appeared in journals such as Grain, Event, The Fiddlehead, filling Station, and Dandelion, as well as in the anthology Jane Austen Sings the Blues (U of A Press). His long poem “Bitumount Debitage” was shortlisted for the 2008 CBC Literary Awards.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A very special thanks to Paul Marshall for the SO84 poster art.

Highlights from Single Onion #83

2011-04-24T19:47:00.001-07:00

Lisa Martin-DeMoor

Inouk Touzin

(Photos courtesy of Connor Ferster)

An Onion Sojourn

2011-03-31T08:28:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion reading series presents: SOJOURN, an evening of poetry with Lisa Martin-DeMoor, Inouk Touzin, and Paul Marshall. The featured readings will be preceded by an open microphone. Single Onion encourages people to speak into this open microphone in anticipation that their utterances will be amplified and projected out over the audience. Single Onion encourages people who wish to speak into the open microphone to arrive early and sign up on the open microphone signup sheet. Single Onion accepts no responsibility for anything resembling poetry projected from the devices connected to the open microphone. Single Onion encourages you to attend, if only for a little while.

WHEN: Thursday, April 21st, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

About the Readers:

Lisa Martin-DeMoor’s poetry has appeared in numerous Canadian literary journals, including Arc, The Antigonish Review, The Fiddlehead, Grain, The Malahat Review and Prairie Fire. Her first collection of poems, One Crow Sorrow (Brindle & Glass), won the Stephan G. Stephannson Award from the Writers Guild of Alberta. Lisa teaches Creative Writing at The King’s University College and Concordia University College in Edmonton. She is in the process of co-editing (with Jessica Hiemstra-van der Horst) an anthology of essays on miscarriage and stillbirth entitled, How to Expect What You’re Not Expecting, and she is currently at work on a novel.

Inouk Touzin is a francophone who's originally from Ontario, but has lived out west 7 years. Actor, playwright, poet, director, administrator and educator, based in Calgary, Inouk graduated with an honours bachelor in theatre from the University of Ottawa. He has interacted with several thousand Canadians through more than 50 Canadian institutions, and organizations over the past 15 years. Going beyond Canada's borders, his poetry has been featured in Chicago, Hong Kong and Taipei. Participant in two UNESCO World Conference for Arts Education (Lisbon 2006 and Seoul 2010), he remains a dynamic element of the Canadian follow-up. In theatre, he has held positions with La Troupe du Jour as Artistic Coordinator; Groupe des Deux as co-artistic director and founding president; ATFC (Association des Théâtres francophones du Canada) as Development agent; and with RAFA (Regroupement artistique francophone de l’Alberta) as Theatre Activator in Calgary. He is currently working for Coopérative Théâtre à Pic as founding artistic Director.

Paul Marshall: Fill this space to say: Who I am & what's been done. Live in this hot climate and wait for sun. Entertain with words given to the masses. Left handed means right brained. Poet/Actor with much to blame. Wrote some wrong, wrote some words. Burnt the bridge before I crossed it. Catching up with tired maple-peppered kisses. Tom Waits describes what he does: “I write adventure songs and Halloween music.” Paul Marshall feels what he does is “large pregnant word whales.”

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A very special thanks Paul Marshall for the SO83 poster art.

Onions at Work

2011-02-23T19:21:00.000-08:00

SINGLE ONION #82 – LECTURE SERIES (Part III of III)

WHAT: Breaking the Taboo: The Poetry of Daily Work

WHEN: Thursday, March 17th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

Do you work for a living? Are your work stories important to you? Do you believe art should reflect our everyday lives? Join Single Onion’s special guest curator Tom Wayman as he traces the history of work writing. The lecture will draw from the live poetry of Sid Marty, Dymphny Dronyk, and Tyler Perry.

With the Support of Calgary Arts Development, Single Onion is proud to present the Single Onion Lecture Series. The Lecture Series is a three part program, featuring three critical poetry topics with entertainment and enlightenment.

About the Participants:

Tom Wayman has edited a number of anthologies of contemporary U.S. and Canadian work poetry, most recently Paperwork (1991). He has published more than 15 collections of his own poems; his latest is High Speed Through Shoaling Water (2007). In addition, Wayman has published two collections of critical essays, primarily on the new work writing, including A Country Not Considered: Canada, Culture, Work (1993). His latest critical book is Songs Without Price: The Music of Poetry in a Discordant World (2008). In 2010 Wayman completed eight years teaching at the University of Calgary, and has returned to full time duties at his estate, "Appledore," in the Selkirk Mountains of southeastern B.C.

Sid Marty is the author of five books of non-fiction and three poetry collections. His recent prose work, The Black Grizzly of Whiskey Creek, was short-listed for the Governor General’s Award in Non-Fiction. In 2008, he was awarded the Grant MacEwan Literary Arts Award for his contribution to the literature of Alberta. The poems in his latest collection, The Rider with Good Hands (Frontenac House), range widely from the prairies and foothills of the rancher to the mountain wilderness of Banff and Jasper national parks, where he once rode herd on the wildlife as a member of the National Park Warden Service.

Dymphny Dronyk is a writer, artist, mediator and mother. She is passionate about the magic of story and has woven words for money (journalism, corporate writing) and for love (poetry, fiction, drama, mystery novels) for over 25 years. Her first volume of poetry, Contrary Infatuations (Frontenac House, Quartet 2007), was short listed for two prestigious awards in 2008. She is also the author of the memoir Bibi – A Life in Clay (Prairie Art Gallery, 2009). With Edmonton poet Angela Kublik, she is the co-publisher of House of Blue Skies, and co-editor of the bestselling anthologies “Writing the Land – Alberta Through its Poets” (2008) and “Home and Away – Alberta Poets Muse on the Meaning of Home” (2010).

T. B. Perry works as a junior high teacher in Calgary and finds that his job supplies him with steady inspiration for poetry. His debut book of poetry, Lessons in Falling, published by B House Publications, is a poetic exploration of the remarkably complex world that goes on in schools today. In his poetry, he provides a candid insider’s view of the classrooms, hallways and staff rooms of contemporary schools. Lessons in Falling was #1 on the Calgary Herald Bestseller list in February 2011. Visit him on the web at http://tbperry.com/.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A very special thanks Paul Marshall for the SO82 poster art.

Highlights from Single Onion #81

2011-02-23T19:14:00.000-08:00

These photos are courtesy of James Tworow. Check out his Flickr site here.

Malcolm Mooney

Sheri-D Wilson

Sheri-D and Malcolm

Highlights from Visual Poetry on Trial

2011-02-06T08:02:00.000-08:00

Photographs courtesy of Carmelia Lee, of filling Station:

The Trial

The Judge

The Prosecution

Audience Participation and a key piece of evidence

The Bailiff

Witness for the Defence

The Defence

Surprise Witness!

Audience Participation

The Jury

The Verdict

Onion Eros

2011-01-26T13:51:00.000-08:00

SINGLE ONION #81 – LECTURE SERIES (Part II of III)

Poetry: Eros that lives.

WHEN: Thursday, February 17th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

Poetry: Eros that lives.

Sheri-D Wilson will riff on the following: Spoken Word – Poetry: that’s entertaining…that lives in the body…that sings… and changes the frequency... Poetry: that laughs…hilarious…that speaks of social injustice…and change…and questions…and comments…on all things… Poetry: that’s mystic …hermetic…transformative…as an alchemy of the mind… Poetry: for all people…as a way of bringing communities together…Poetry: that gives back!

This will be a Round Table – where everyone has a voice – possibility – community. We will breathe together and build sound as a unit. HOWL will be present –

Why “become” a poet?

How to “become” a poet?

What becomes important in life when you are a poet. Poetry: is a way of seeing, being and listening – before speaking. It is how we live – how we make our life - it is not about making a living.

Option: Bring a notebook.

Stay tuned for details on Single Onion Lecture Series Part III (Tom Wayman).

Single Onion’s new Ezine can be found at: http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

For the most up to date Single Onion news check us out on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/singleonion

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A very special thanks Paul Marshall for the SO81 poster art.

Lecture Series, Part 1

2011-01-09T12:33:00.000-08:00

SINGLE ONION #80 – LECTURE SERIES (Part I of III)

Visual Poetry On Trial

You decide the fate of the world's strangest literary phenomenon!

WHEN: Thursday, January 20th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 - 9th Ave SE

What is Visual Poetry? Why do poets insist on creating apparently meaningless and amateur-looking visual pieces out of letters and words when there are perfectly good, well-trained visual artists around? That's the question two separate peer juries from national and local granting bodies asked themselves before they made the decision to cut filling Station Magazine's funding for 2011, just for having included a short Visual Poetry feature in one issue. But is Visual Poetry really so offensive? Don't the poets have a reason for making the work, and doesn't the audience get something out of it? Or are these poems really meaningless?

The verdict is up to you! Join filling Station Managing Editor Laurie Fuhr in an attempt to get down to the truth. Hear from the defense and the prosecution as they examine and cross-examine key witnesses and the poetic evidence they present. At the end of the trial, you, the men & women of the Jury, are charged with the task of deciding whether Visual Poetry has the right to keep on living, or whether it should be hanged up by the cursive tails of its b's & d's.

Stay tuned for details on Single Onion Lecture Series Part II (Sheri-D Wilson) and Part III (Tom Wayman).

Single Onion’s new Ezine can be found at: http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

For the most up to date Single Onion news check us out on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/singleonion

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

A very special thanks to Derek Beaulieu for the SO80 poster art.

Pictures from Single Onion #79

2010-12-17T15:34:00.001-08:00

Eugene Stickland

Kimmy Beach

Keith Worthington

Onion Textures

2010-12-09T18:46:00.000-08:00

With the support of the League of Canadian Poets, The Single Onion is proud to present: Texture, an evening of poetry with Eugene Stickland, Kimmy Beach, and Keith Worthington.

WHEN: Thursday, December 16th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

About the Featured Readers:

Eugene Stickland grew up in Regina, where he eventually worked on an MA in English at the University of Regina, which was interrupted when he went to Toronto to complete an MFA in Playwriting, at York University. Eugene wrote plays in Toronto for a number of years for the Act IV Theatre Company before moving to Calgary in 1994. While in Calgary, Eugene enjoyed a 10 year stint as Alberta Theatre Projects’ playwright in residence, writing 6 plays for the company in that time, along with others for other theatres across Canada. On leaving ATP, Eugene became a feature columnist for the Calgary Herald for five years. His plays have been produced around the world in many different languages. He is currently working on several new projects, including a poetic novel which he has read from at various readings around Calgary. Eugene has just embarked on a new venture as entertainment and cultural editor of Calgary’s online newspaper, The Beacon. Eugene was recently appointed playwright in residence at Calgary’s St. Mary’s University College.

Kimmy Beach’s fourth collection, in cars, was published by turnstone press in the spring of 2007. She’s currently working on her fifth full collection, “Band Box at the Last Chance Saloon,” a nonfiction book about her two trips to a tiny village on the south coast of Crete, and a collection of flash fiction, unstageable drama, poetry, intrigue, top-secret dossiers, files marked “for your eyes only,” and witty repartée starring James Bond. She has four books of poetry, all with Turnstone press (Winnipeg), and one chapbook, “Aberrant lounges,” with the Martian press (Calgary). She holds a first class honours degree in English from the University of Alberta, and is the first and only poet laureate of Humboldt collegiate Institute in Humboldt, Saskatchewan. Kimmy had a terrific gig as Parkland Regional Library first writer-in-residence (a project of the Writers Guild of Alberta and the Library Association of Alberta) and spent her time between March and May, 2008, on the road to rural libraries giving workshops, doing readings, and mentoring to up-and-coming writers near and far (but mostly far). Kimmy was the 2005 international guest poet for the dead good poets society in Liverpool, UK, where she was invited to launch her third book, fake paul, onstage at the Cavern Club in Mathew Street. Her second book, Alarum Within: Theatre Poems, was adapted as a full-length stage play by both the University of Toronto at Mississauga (Erindale Theatre) and the Red Deer College Theatre and Film Studies Programme. Her work has been published across Canada and in the U.K. She’s been translated into Chinese, and her poetry has been broadcast on CBC Radio, Radio Canada International, Bravo!, Book TV, Access, and Canadian Learning Television. Our heroine was born nine months and one day after the Beatles appeared on “The Ed Sullivan Show” for the first time, which explains a great deal.

Keith Worthington is a Calgary poet who has recently launched his second collection: Poet on a Cargo Plane. In it, he travels to landscapes near and far, encountering humanity—real and imagined. As in 2007's Puffs of Breath, lines and images from the poems are enhanced by the calligraphy of Keith's wife, Renate. Buckle up; enjoy the flight.

Single Onion’s new Ezine can be found at: http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

For the most up to date Single Onion news check us out on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/singleonion

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

Kimmy Beach and the Onions

2010-11-03T18:02:00.000-07:00

With the support of the League of Canadian Poets, The Single Onion is proud to present Shimmerings, an evening with Kimmy Beach. The featured reading will be preceded by the poetry stylings of Dale Herrington and an open-mic. Come early to sign-up for the open mic.

WHEN: Thursday, November 18th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163, 115 - 9th Ave SE

About the Featured Readers:

Dale Herrington lives, reads and writes in Calgary. He is a member of The Single Onion, and Most Vocal Poets of Lethbridge. Dale is also the collaborator, producer and coordinator for RAW Salvage, podcasting spoken word over the internet at calgaryspokenword.podbean.com. His work has appeared in several provincial and local anthologies and mythos, majicks and crossroads, his first collection of prose, is still available at Pages Books here in Calgary.

Single Onion’s new Ezine can be found at: http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

Brian Brett Reading for the Onions

2010-10-22T18:18:00.001-07:00

Thursday, Oct. 21, 2010

Footprints

2010-10-03T08:42:00.000-07:00

Poetry immortalizes the impression of the soul. Come be impressed by poets Brian Brett, Meghan Doraty, and Lori D. Roadhouse. The featured readings will be preceded by an open-mic. Come early to sign-up for the open mic.

WHEN: Thursday, October 21st, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 115 9th Ave SE

About the Featured Readers:

Brian Brett is the author of Uproar’s Your Only Music—a Globe and Mail Book of the Year—and several books of poetry. His most recent work of non-fiction is Trauma Farm, which was listed as an Amazon top 100 book of 2009, a Globe and Mail top 100 book for 2009, and a Times Literary Supplement top 100 book for 2009. The book is described as an irreverent and illuminating journey through a day in the life of the affectionately named Trauma Farm, with numerous side trips into the natural history of farming. In the early seventies, he began working as a free lance journalist and critic for various publications and newspapers, including The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, The Vancouver Sun, The New Reader, Books In Canada, The Victoria Times-Colonist, and The Vancouver Province -- where he was the poetry critic for two years, and had his own column. His journalism has appeared in almost every major newspaper in Canada, and his essays in most of the major magazines. He is currently writing a monthly newspaper column called CultureWatch for the Yukon News.

Meghan Doraty is a creative writing student. She is an editor of NōD (pronounced Node) magazine and the curator for Flywheel Reading Series. She is currently at work on a short story collection and a poetry collaboration with patients of the Foothills hospital.

Lori D. Roadhouse is short on height and big on words. She's deeply involved in the local, provincial, and national poetry scenes. She is the Poet-In-Residence for the Radiant Lights e-zine and founder of the Hilltop Writers. She has read at the Canadian League of Poets’ National Poetry Month Western Tour, the Calgary International Spoken Word Festival, and for Red Mile Revenge, Passion Pitch, Magpie Haiku Poets and the Calgary SLAM. Lori was recently awarded a fellowship in writing which took her to Concordia University in Montreal in June. She currently has two manuscripts of poetry being considered for publication.

Single Onion’s new Ezine can be found at: http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

For the most up to date Single Onion news check us out on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/singleonion

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets and Calgary Arts Development.

Flatfield

2010-08-29T19:59:00.000-07:00

Is poetry flat? Theory suggests poems are discs floating in an infinite ocean. Can you fall off the edge if you read too far? Is it safe to distance ourselves from the shores of poetry? For an answer to these important questions, come to the Single Onion fall-season premiere featuring readings by Calgary poets: Jude Dillon, Jane MacKinnon and Dylan McCafferty. The main event will be preceded by an open mic. Come early to sign-up for the open mic.

WHEN: Thursday, September 16th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163, 115 - 9th Ave SE

About the Featured Readers:

Jude Dillon is a poet in waiting. Waiting for women, publishers, and morning coffee. The sun came up, the temperature fell, and the poems spilled out. Where can we find them? Rattle the bucket, fish or cut bait. The world may be waiting too. These poems are from his three unpublished collections: Happy There in My Agony, a cloud of birds just breaking into rain, and The Wind on a Witchy Road. Jude lives in Calgary.

Jane MacKinnon is a relative new-be in the world of poetry. She began her career with a poem published in her high school year book, and then took a rather long hiatus before starting up again. Jane began reading seriously at the Red Mile Revenge, was a featured reader at Passion Pitch, and had a green poem published in Green Leaf Cafe: A Collection of Poems by Calgarians (April, 2010). Her poetry allows her to explore aspects of her life in a very interesting way, and she looks forward to any opportunity to share and listen.

Dylan McCafferty is a recent university grad who is currently focusing on the indoctrination of rabid Canadian children. He enjoys the creation and consumption of liquid bread and is in the midst of compiling a series of poems called "Stuff is the new things." That may or may not be a lie. He also composes biographical limericks on demand, and his poems were most recently featured in NōD Magazine.

Single Onion’s new Ezine can be found at: http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

The Onions have a Poetry E-Zine

2010-07-20T14:35:00.000-07:00

http://www.singleonionpoetry.blogspot.com/

Check out the Single Onion's e-zine, dedicated to publishing fantastic poetry from Calgary and beyond. It's curated by the newest Onion board member, Jude Dillon. Please note: event listings will still be posted at this site.

The Onions and Sled Island: Together at Last!

2010-06-29T19:29:00.000-07:00

filling Station’s Flywheel, Dandelion Magazine, and the Single Onion present: 

POETRY OCEAN  at Sled Island

When: Thursday, July 1, 2010 – Doors at 8:30, Music at 9:30, Poetry at 10:30 

Where: The Arrata Opera Centre: 1315 7 Street SW

Featuring Poetry by Natalie Simpson & Rael Bischoff (filling Station's Flywheel), Claire Lacey & ryan fitzpatrick (Dandelion), Francis Willey & Tiana Hunter (Single Onion)

Music by Woodpigeon, Christine Owman, and Savk 

Tickets:  Poetry Ocean is presented as part of the Sled Island Music Festival.  Sled Island wristbands are available at www.sledisland.com. Tickets will also be available at the door for $15.

Magazines and CDs will also be available for purchase.

Proceeds from bar sales raise funds for these three wonderful non-profit literary organizations.

*Please note that there is no cash machine on site. Machines are nearby on 17th Avenue.* 

Halation

2010-06-01T17:48:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion Presents Halation, featuring the poetry stylings of Steven Ross Smith, Julie Sedivy, and Paul Marshall. The main event will be preceded by an Open Mic Stew. Open Mic contestants are encouraged to come early, assemble a team and perform their works in harmonic unison. A tangible prize will be awarded to the best Open Mic Stew.

WHEN: Thursday, June 17th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 - 115 9th Ave SE

COST: Free, thanks to our fantastic sponsors, including The Canada Council for the Arts, The League of Canadian Poets, and the Auburn Saloon.

About the Featured Readers:

Steven Ross Smith, writer and sound poet, has published 11 books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, and has appeared on more than 10 recordings in group and solo contexts. His poetry book fluttertongue book 3: disarray won the 2005 Saskatchewan Book Awards Book-of-the-Year Award. The chapbook Pliny’s Knickers, a collaboration between Smith, poet Hilary Clark and artist Betsy Rosenwald, won the 2006 bpNichol Chapbook Award. His most recent book – fluttertongue 4: adagio for the pressured surround – was short-listed for the 2007 Saskatchewan Book Award for Poetry. He has also been creating and performing sound poetry for 3 decades in collaborative and solo contexts. Smith has performed his work and/or been published in England, Holland, Russia, Portugal, USA, and Canada. He has also been an arts journalist, television writer and arts administrator, working at various times for various arts publications, CBC television, TVOntario, Saskatchewan Writers Guild, Sage Hill Writing Experience, the literary journal Grain, and a press co-operative called Underwhich Editions. His next book of poetry, fluttertongue 5: everything appears to shine with mossy splendour, will be published in 2011 by Turnstone Press of Winnipeg.

Julie Sedivy is a cognitive scientist and linguist whose love of language swings between science and poetry. She is the lead author of the forthcoming nonfiction book “Sold on Language: How Advertisers Talk to You and What It Says About You,” to be published this January by John Wiley & Sons. She is a recent acquisition of the Calgary poetry scene, and is at work on her first manuscript of poems titled “Behind the Sacristy” which is being made possible by her profoundly Catholic upbringing. She satisfies her altruistic impulses by serving as the Vice-President of the Board of the Writer’s Guild of Alberta.

When Paul Marshall was alive, he was a shape-shifting demon. Now he is a sleep-walking shaman...in search of the next flying dream. In short, he is better than a love letter, and he delivers verse with the power of a curse. Paul Marshall is also the current Single Onion Freestyle Champion.

Passionate Onions

2010-05-10T20:32:00.000-07:00

WHAT: Single Onion Presents: Pitch – An evening of projectiles and persuasion, featuring the poetry stylings of Kirk Ramdath, Beth Langford, Bob MacKenzie, and Patrick Horner.

WHEN: Thursday, May 20th, at 7:30 p.m.

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163, 115 - 9th Ave SE

COST: Free, because of our fantastic sponsors!

Kirk Ramdath is a Trinidad-born Canadian poet who lives and writes in Calgary. His writing has taken him to stages across Canada, including Victoria, Saskatoon, Toronto, and Halifax. Thanks to writing grants from Canada Council for the Arts, Kirk has completed Love from a Handful of Dust, a poetry manuscript containing two epic poems to be published in 2011. Kirk is the organizer of Passion Pitch Poetry. Previous to that, Kirk created and was Editor-in-Chief of Eleventh Transmission, Calgary’s arts, culture, media, and activism magazine. Kirk believes that voice is of supreme importance. And love.

Beth Langford is a Calgary poet whose favourite subjects include the city and its various avian inhabitants. This past year, she attended a course at the University of Calgary in writing the book-length poetry manuscript. Not surprisingly, her manuscript was about Calgary. Beth's short fiction and poetry have appeared in such publications as A Field Guide to Surreal Botany, Electric Velocipede, and dandelion. She is an editor of the speculative fiction webzine ideomancer and a volunteer for local literary and arts magazine filling Station.

Bob MacKenzie is a widely published Canadian poet, songwriter and arts journalist, Bob MacKenzie has, for almost forty years, expressed his art in a multi-media format involving printed, spoken, and sung words; performance; and multi-media visual art involving photography, painting, print making, and collage. Bob's literary, theatre, and music reviews have appeared in academic and literary journals, been published in major newspapers across Canada, been aired on local radio and television stations as well as regional and national CBC Radio, and been published on several sites on the internet. Since 1995, Bob has written Sound Bytes, a music review column especially for the World Wide Web, with a focus on music with a traditional or "roots" component, including folk, blues, jazz, and country music. In addition to his print publications, Bob is a performer and founder of the performance group Poem de Terre, and it is around his poetry and stories that the eclectic spoken and sung folk-rock sound of Poem de Terre has evolved.

Patrick Horner is a Calgary writer. He has of late been focused on radio production including documentary and dramatic works. Patrick’s fiction and poetry have been published in Dandelion Magazine, Freefall Magazine, Backyard Ashes, The Prairie Journal and most recently, The Fist Book of Cowtown Poetry. He is currently the publicity director for the Single Onion Reading Series.

Poet Technology

2010-04-11T14:07:00.000-07:00

What: The Single Onion is teaming up with the Calgary International Spoken Word Festival to broadcast a special live reading from the Banff Centre. This real-time video presentation will feature poets from around the world, including Regie Cabico (Washington, DC), Bob Holman (New York City), Kobus Moolman (Durban, South Africa), evalyn parry (Toronto), Steven Ross Smith (Banff), and Sheri-D Wilson (Calgary).

When: (note the special date) Wednesday, April 14, 2010, at 6:30 p.m.

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 - 155 9th Ave SE

Bios:

Regie Cabico is a poet and spoken word pioneer, having won the Nuyorican Poets Café Grand Slam in 1993 and taking top prizes in the 1993, 1994 & 1997 National Poetry Slams. Television appearances include 2 seasons on HBO’s Def Poetry Jam. His work appears in over 30 anthologies including Aloud: Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Café, Spoken Word Revolution and The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry. He co-edited Poetry Nation: A North American Anthology of Fusion Poetry (1998, Vehicule Press). He is a recipient of a 2008 Future Aesthetics Arts Award Regrant from The Ford Foundation/Hip Hop Theater Festival, 3 New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships for Poetry and Multidisciplinary Performance, The Larry Neal Awards for Poetry 2007 (3rd Place) and 2008 (1st Place), a 2008 DC Commission for the Arts Poetry Fellowship. He received the 2006 Writers for Writers Award from Poets & Writers for his work teaching at-risk youth at Bellevue Hospital in New York.

Bob Holman: From Slam to hip-hop, from performance poetry to Spoken Word, Bob Holman has been a central figure in the re-emergence of poetry in the US, Canada and beyond. He is currently creating a documentary series for LinkTV on the poetry of Endangered Languages – the roots of our current poetry performance practice are disappearing. How about: 10 books including A Couple of Ways of Doing Something, a collaboration with Chuck Close; 2 CDs including In With the Out Crowd produced by Hal Willner; TV series on PBS and MTV, including The United States of Poetry and 3 Emmys; 5 edited by or intros by, including Aloud! Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, American Book Award winner. Holman teaches at Columbia and NYU, and is founder and proprietor of the Bowery Poetry Club. His current work centers on the poetry of Endangered Languages: LinkTV will begin airing his series spring 2010. He is also curating the Endangered Cento, a hundred-line poem with each line from a different endangered language, to be projected on the Secretariat of the UN as a rallying point – half the languages on earth will disappear before the end of the century, unless….

Kobus Moolman: An award-winning poet and playwright, educator and editor, Kobus Moolman teaches creative writing in the Department of English at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban. He is regarded as one of South Africa’s leading lyrical poets. He is the author of 3 solo collections of poetry, Time like Stone (2000), Feet of the Sky (2003), and Separating the Seas (2007), as well as a joint collection, 5 Poetry (2001), with 4 other South African poets. His debut collection, Time like Stone, was awarded the prestigious Ingrid Jonker Prize for 2001. He was the founding editor of the annual KwaZulu-Natal poetry journal, Fidelities, which ran from 1995 until 2007. In 2003 he was a finalist in the BBC African Performance radio drama competition. His winning play, Soldier Boy, was produced for the BBC World Service. In 2008 he produced an illustrated, limited edition collection entitled Anatomy. This collection was later published in the Journal of Disability Studies (Ohio State University). It won the Dramatic and Literary Rights Organization Prize for the best poem to appear in New Coin magazine in 2008.

evalyn parry is an award-winning spoken word artist, songwriter and theatre creator. Her solo and collaborative performances have taken her to music, storytelling, poetry and theatre festivals from coast to coast of North America, and she has released 3 critically acclaimed CDs of music and spoken word (Small Theatres, on Borealis Records) as well as a live concert DVD and several video poems. She is the recipient of numerous grants and awards, including the Colleen Peterson Songwriting Award (Ontario Arts Council), The Beth Ferguson Award and nomination for the KM Hunter Award for Music (Ontario Arts Council). Her newest creation is a show entitled SPIN (a music-and-spoken-word-cycle which explores the connections between bicycles, women and advertising) which will be touring in the summer of 2010, starting with the 2010 Sound Symposium in St John’s Newfoundland.

He has also been an arts journalist, television writer and arts administrator, working at various times for various arts publications, CBC television, TVOntario, Saskatchewan Writers Guild, Sage Hill Writing Experience, the literary journal Grain, and a press co-operative called Underwhich Editions.

His next book of poetry, fluttertongue 5: everything appears to shine with mossy splendour will be published in 2011 by Turnstone Press of Winnipeg.

Sheri-D Wilson has 7 collections of poetry; her most recent, Autopsy of a Turvy World ('08, Frontenac House); Re:Zoom (‘05), which won the ‘06 Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry, was shortlisted for the CanLit award. She has 2 CDs, and 4 award-winning VideoPoems. Her other awards include: Woman of Vision Award, Bumpershoot Heavyweight Title For Poetry USA, CBC Faceoff: in ‘09 Sheri-D was chosen 1 of the Top-10 Poets in Canada by CBC Arts, in ‘10 Geist called her “the Canadian author who would make the best lover!” In ‘03, Sheri-D founded CISWF which is now one of the most respected spoken word festivals in Canada. Since ‘08, she has been Director of the Spoken Word Program at The Banff Centre. www.sheridwilson.com Eros.

Onions, Flywheel, et al.

2010-03-22T20:15:00.000-07:00

Tenderly, with Onions

2010-03-08T20:11:00.000-08:00

The Single Onion and Dandelion Magazine present Tenderloins, the official launch of Dandelion issue 35.2 and readings by Cara Hedley, Kathleen Brown, Bruce Rout, and Dale Herrington. The main event will be preceded by a special selection open mic, see details below.

WHEN: Thursday, March 18th, at 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Auburn Saloon, #163 155 9th Ave SE

SUGGESTED ADMISSION: Purchase an issue (or better yet a subscription) of the new issue of Dandelion.

Cara Hedley has lived in England and western Canada, and calls Winnipeg and Lake of the Woods home. After playing three seasons with the University of Manitoba Bison women’s hockey team, she moved to Calgary, where she completed an MA in English Literature and Creative Writing. Cara has been a member of the Dandelion magazine editorial collective and performed as part of a collaborative poetic ensemble in Calgary, Toronto and Scotland.

Kathleen Brown writes plays, poetry and prose. She is a first year PhD Candidate in Creative Writing at U of C. She is the Assistant Editor of Dandelion magazine, a Co-Director of The Vagabond Trust, and a card carrying member of the Snow Ninja Society. She has work forthcoming in The Poet's Theatre issue of The Capilano Review.

Dale Herrington has read all over Calgary’s early street poetry and spoken-word venues, going far back to the 1980’s. He has read and busked on Stephen Avenue in front of the Bay. He has read at the undergrounds and Theatery’s Potporie readings. Dale fondly remembers being asked to leave a 1989 Calgary Creative Reading Series Venue, due to the graphic nature of his then edgy? poetry, a piece titled “Anger, Curses and Red Dancing.” A little to loud for the poetry scene of that time. Dale A Herrington continues to reside in Calgary. He is the producer behind RAW Salvage, which has pod cast spoken word and poetry events in Calgary and Southern Alberta for the past two years. Dale remains an active community poet, involved in collaborations with many local reading series.

Bruce Rout was born in 1948 in the back seat of Bert's cab in Paparoa, New Zealand, on land that has been returned to Maori people. He first hitch hiked to Canada in 1950 with his parents, arriving in Vancouver and then moving to Toronto. Bruce started out as a poet in 1962. He then hitchhiked throughout the United States, traveling through such interesting places as the White House while JFK was president, the Detroit riots, and the Democratic Convention in Chicago in 1968. He lived on the Expo grounds during Expo 67. He lived in Quebec for a couple of years and hitchhiked across Canada starting in 1967. Bruce can't remember how many times he has hitchhiked across Canada. He says it was difficult because he was carrying a portable typewriter at the time that didn't fit into his knapsack. Recently Bruce has been working on fundamental mathematical research into social problems. He has turned from mathematics to philosophy and this year has returned to poetry. He has published a book of poetry titled Postage Due -- deep from the depths of the 60s.

OPEN MIC: The first four artists to email singleonion@hotmail.com and state their intention of throwing down on the open mic will be selected for inclusion in the once ever Single Onion #72 Tenderloins line-up. Selected participants will receive five free minutes of premium, electrified open microphone experience. Please include your complete name and brief bio with your statement of intent to read.

For Dandelion Magazine submission & subscription information, visit: www.dandelionmag.ca

Midnight Yoga for Alcoholics

2010-01-30T09:24:00.000-08:00


Single Onion presents: Midnight Yoga for Alcoholics, a special event featuring the music and spoken word of Kirk Miles and Cennth Sinclair.

How to sign-up for classes:
Step One. Take a back porch gut-bucket of blues (the label should read old school). The kind that creeps out of the Mississippi delta like a snake tongued guitar. Step Two. In to the bucket blend in the modern cadences of incisive spoken word. Step Three. Garnish with a jazzed penny-whistle. You are now enrolled in sound fusion. An art as old as the poet and as new as the microphone. Welcome to midnight yoga for alcoholics.

WHEN: Thursday, February 18th, at 7:00 PM 

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: This Special Event will Cost $5 at the door. 
OUR SPONSORS - The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

OPEN MIC: The first four artists to email singleonion@hotmail.com and state their intention of throwing down on the open mic will be selected for inclusion in the once ever Single Onion #71 Draw line-up. Selected participants will receive five free minutes of premium, electrified open microphone experience. Please include your complete name and brief bio with your statement of intent to read.

Cennth Sinclair: Cen began his musical career studying violin and was an active member of a high school orchestra. After graduating in 1975 Cen spent ten years playing in various bar bands as either a fiddler or rhythm guitar player while working full time. In 1986 he attended the University of Calgary, and graduated in 1991 with a BSc in Anthropology with a specialty in music ethnography. For the next nine years Cen continued to pursue his musical career until in 2000 Cen picked up the blues guitar. He has been mesmerized by its haunting sound ever since. In the last seven years he has worked or collaborated with several different luminaries in the Calgary music scene. For twenty-five years Cen has been a fixture in the Calgary music scene and will continue to add to the culture as a virtuoso blues slide guitar player for years to come.

Kirk Miles: His poems have been produced on CBC’s Alberta Anthology and his poetry and short stories have been published by several journals in western Canada. He is a playwright and a founding member of One Yellow Rabbit Performance Theatre. He has had several plays professionally produced and has earned recognition for his work including a playwriting award from Alberta Culture for co-writing the critically acclaimed Juggler on a Drum. Touchwood Press published a book of poetry entitled The Last Six Minutes of Elvis in 2002. In the fall of 2007 Bravo aired a half hour special on his life as a poet, playwright and clown. In the spring of 2009 he attended the Banff Leighton Artist Colony, where he finished a manuscript entitled of ash of brick of water, which, will be published in the winter of 2010 by Plan-B House publishing. In June of 2009 Kirk Miles won the Alberta Screenwriters Award for a screenplay entitled Shadow Maker.

Onions on the Web

2010-01-27T19:00:00.000-08:00

Check out these videos of the last Single Onion reading, now featured at Ustream:

Cecilia Frey

Lori Roadhouse

T Crane

A New Year with The Single Onion

2010-01-03T15:42:00.000-08:00

The Single Onion presents DRAW, an evening of poetry featuring Cecelia Frey, T Crane, and Lori D Roadhouse. The evening will also include a special selection open mic (see details below).

WHEN: Thursday, January 21st, at 7:00 PM

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors - The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

Cecelia Frey was born in northern Alberta, grew up in Edmonton and now lives in Calgary. She studied at the University of Alberta and, after raising a family, returned to the University of Calgary where she completed an M.A. in English. Cecelia has worked as an editor, teacher and freelance writer and has long been involved in the Calgary literary community. Her short stories and poetry have been published in dozens of literary journals and anthologies as well as being broadcast on CBC radio and performed on the Women’s Television Network. Her numerous reviews, essays and articles have appeared in a wide range of publications including newspapers such as The Calgary Herald and The Globe and Mail and journals as varied as Westworld and Canadian Literature.

T Crane is a poet and personal development facilitator and teacher. He recently moved to Calgary from Vancouver and is in love with the skies here. He is a poet by blood, with language emanating from his pores – showers do not help but he takes them anyway. There are no books available, nor cd’s, nor dvd’s of his performances, there is no public record that can be found. T Crane remains as both his own shadow and source of light. He loves to tell stories.

Lori D Roadhouse is a singer, performer and writer. She co-created the 2003 Writing Toward the Light Poetry Contest/Concert and founded the Hilltop Writers. She is a member of the Red Mile Revenge Poets, Passion Pitch Poetry, Magpie Haiku Poets, The Single Onions, and MOST VOCAL Poets. Lori was a featured poet at South Country Fair 2008, and she was co-artistic director, MC and performer there in '09. She also read at the Canadian League of Poets’ National Poetry Month Western Tour, the Calgary International Spoken Word Festival, and at monthly readings for other groups. Lori currently has two manuscripts of poetry being considered for publication.

OPEN MIC: The first four artists to email singleonion@hotmail.com and state their intention of throwing down on the open mic will be selected for inclusion in the once ever Single Onion #70 Draw line-up. Selected participants will receive five free minutes of premium, electrified open microphone experience. Please include your complete name and brief bio with your statement of intent to read.

Christmas with the Onions

2009-11-25T18:06:00.000-08:00

The Single Onion presents Parameter, a spotlight performance with Sheri Benning. The main event will be preceded by a special selection open-mic.

WHEN: Thursday, December 17th, at 7:00 PM

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen,

612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors - The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

Sheri Benning grew up on a small farm in central Saskatchewan. Her second book of poetry, Thin Moon Psalm (Brick Books, 2007), recently won two Saskatchewan Book Awards – The Poetry Award and The City of Saskatoon Award. In 2004 Thin Moon Psalm was the recipient of the Alfred G. Bailey Manuscript Award. Her first book of poetry, Earth After Rain (Thistledown Press, 2001), also won two Saskatchewan Book Awards. Sheri is the recipient of the Earle Birney Poetry Prize, the second place recipient of the Bliss Carmen Poetry Award and in 2004 she was awarded the Saskatchewan Lieutenant Governor's Award for Achievement in the Arts. Her poetry has been published in numerous Canadian literary journals and anthologies, including Breathing Fire 2; Fast Forward: New Saskatchewan Poets; and Third Floor Lounge. She is currently a doctoral student at the University of Alberta.

OPEN MIC: The first four artists to email singleonion@hotmail.com and state their intention of throwing down on the open-mic will be selected for inclusion in the once ever Single Onion #69 Parameter line-up. Selected participants will receive five free minutes of premium, electrified open microphone experience. Please include your complete name and brief bio with your statement of intent to read.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and The League of Canadian Poets.

2009-10-28T10:58:00.001-07:00

The Single Onion presents Diffluence, a spotlight performance with Jenna Butler. The reading will be preceded by an open mic.

WHEN: Thursday, November 19^th, at 7:00 p.m. [Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen,

612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors - The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

Jenna Butler's work has garnered a number of awards and has been published both in Canada and internationally in literary magazines, anthologies and journals. Butler was born in Norwich, England, but has spent the majority of her life on the prairies of western Canada. She now lives in Edmonton, where she teaches literature and rhetoric at MacEwan College. She is the editor of more than twenty-five collections of poetry in Canada and Europe, and is the founding editor of Rubicon Press. As well, she is the author of three short collections of poetry and her first full-length book, Aphelion, will appear with NeWest Press this spring.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and The League of Canadian Poets.

Poetic Contraptions

2009-10-05T13:48:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion presents: Recompression, a poetry experience with Weyman Chan, James Dangerous, and Patrick Horner. The readings will be preceded by an open mic, four artists will be selected by a draw from the sign-up list and have five minutes each to perform.

WHEN: Thursday, October 15^th, at 7:00 p.m. [Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS: Weyman Chan, James Dangerous, Patrick Horner

BIOGRAPHIES:

Weyman Chan, a laboratory technician by trade, wrote his first poem when he was thirteen years old. Distilling a unique voice and ethnic point of view in the spiraling, non-sequential and non-temporal nature of poetry remains the most liberating form of expression he has found to engage in. “Every writer must come to terms with their own inner language—and it takes time to learn how to use it to best effect.” His most recent work, Noise from the Laundry, was a finalist for the Governor General's Award for Poetry (2008) and shortlisted for the Alberta Literary Awards (2009). This book is an intimate journey of rituals attempting to find their origin, where past and future are seen to conjoin to construct one biography in a fractured and disbelieving age.

James Dangerous has been a writer for as long as he can remember, and writes short fiction, novels, poetry, critical theory, logomythos, and song. Most of that work deals with what he calls "Ludacris Realism", or the absurdity of the everyday deconstructed. His written work has been published in Sweden and in Canada, most recently in NōD Magazine, fillingStation, and dANDelion. His story entitled "This Mess of Fiction" was nominated for the 2005 McLelland and Stewart Journey Prize. His current large project is a logomythos entitled Two Eternities of Darkness, the creation of a people, geography, and culture out of the creation of a fictional language, complete with alphabet, grammar, and etymology.

Patrick Horner is a writer, engineer and proud new father. Believing writers both need and are needed by local community, he coordinated writing workshops the Bowden Correctional Institution, the Alberta Psychiatric Hospital and co-founded Crossing Place, the Red Deer Writers festival. His poetry and fiction has appeared in dANDdelion, The Prairie Journal, Freefall Magazine, and Backyard Ashes. Co-founder of B Baker Street Productions, he currently writes and directs for Waste Dump, a serial radio play and an up and coming audio documentary featuring the Calgary spoken word scene.

The Onions Recompress!

2009-09-03T15:42:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion presents Recompression, a poetry experience with Stephen Brockwell, Jen Kunlire, and Brent Schaus. The readings will be preceded by an open mic: four artists will be selected by a draw from the sign-up list and have five minutes each to perform. The event will be followed by the Marquee Song Writers Showcase, featuring Shane Ghostkeeper and Samantha Savage Smith.

WHEN: Thursday, September 17^th, at 7:00 p.m. [Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS: Stephen Brockwell, Jen Kunlire, Brent Schaus

BIOGRAPHIES:

Stephen Brockwell lives, writes and works in Ottawa and other places. He is the author of The Wire in Fences, Cometology, and the Archibald Lampman Award-winning Fruitfly Geographic. He is co-editor of the online journal www.poetics.ca. His latest collection, the real made up, improvises on the simple idea of imitation; mimicry becomes a kind of cadence for an interweaving of transcribed speech, ironic song, jarring randomization, post–colonial irony, and blatant theft. The book itself is made up of real and imaginary interviews with people off the street, of poems by others and poems from others. Every poem in the real made up is an attempt to revel in or escape from — an impossible task — the imitative traces of everyone else.

Jen Kunlire a local activist, poet and dreamer. An emerging poet on the Calgary scene she has performed extensively in a relatively short time throughout the city. Some of these events include including Afrikadey Poetry Jam, Single Onion Fundraiser/CD Chapbook launch, One Yellow Rabbit High Performance Rodeo Midway, the 2008 Calgary Slam Team and recent 2009 Barack Obama Inauguration Party. She also formed Humble Line Press in 2008, an alternative grassroots paper focusing on local & international concerns, artist showcase and community voice. Jen represented Calgary in the 2009 CBC Poetry Face-Off.

Brent Schaus graduated from Concordia University's Creative Writing Program. As a spoken word artist, he blends poetry, comedy, music and drag. He has shared the stage with David McGimpsey, Jon Paul Fiorentino, Catherine Kidd and Alexis O'Hara. His work was published in Headlight Anthology, and he served as an Editorial Assistant at Matrix Magazine where, along with filling station magazine, he published several book and music reviews. He is delighted to be Single Onion's newest member.

Dead Canadians

2009-07-28T22:14:00.000-07:00

WHAT: As a precursor to this fall’s exciting live poetry lineup, Single Onion presents: Dead Canadians. This event invites participants to sign up for a special open mic to read the poetry of their favorite dead Canadian poets. The event will be followed by the Marquee Song Writer’s Series.

WHEN: Thursday, August 20th, at 7:00 p.m. [Sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

Bring a selection of poetry from your favorite dead Canadian poets. Length of time allotted to readers will depend on the number of people who sign up.

Onion Freestyle Free-for-all

2009-07-05T15:44:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion is hosting an open Freestyle poetry competition!

The competition will be preceded by an Open Mic and followed by the Marquee Song Writers Showcase, featuring Brent Tyler and guest.

WHEN: Thursday, July 16th, at 7:00 pm [Freestyle and Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

MC: Brent Schaus
Freestyle Referee: Dale Herrington

Freestyle Competition Details:

Two competitors will be selected at random from the sign-up sheet and advance to the stage where they will each spit spontaneous improvised verse for thirty seconds back and forth for a total two-minute round. The winner of the round will be determined by overall audience enthusiasm and will then advance to the semi finals. Semi finalists will compete in a similar fashion and the winners will advance to the finals where they battle for the title of Single Onion Freestyle Champion.

Rules:

1. Competitors MUST Freestyle – all verse must be improvised on the spot, no written or pre-rehearsed material allowed.
2. Competitors must sign up prior to 7:15 pm.
3. Competitors must be 18 years or older (licensed venue).

Spoken Word in Calgary is Online

2009-06-21T20:22:00.000-07:00

Onion board member Dale Herrington has been recording tons of spoken word events around Calgary over the past several months, including Single Onion readings. Check it out here.

An Onion Countermeasure

2009-06-04T16:16:00.000-07:00

WHAT: Countermeasure, a poetry and music experience with Kirk Miles and Ken Sinclair, Lori D. Roadhouse, and Rael Xavier Bischoff. The readings will be preceded by an open mic: four artists will be selected by a draw from the sign-up list and have five minutes each to perform. The event will be followed by the Marquee Song Writers Showcase, featuring Laura Leif and Clinton St. John.

WHEN: Thursday, June 18th, at 7:00 p.m. [Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS: Kirk Miles + Ken Sinclair, Lori D. Roadhouse, and Rael Xavier Bischoff

MC: David Martin

BIOGRAPHIES:

Kirk Miles’ poems have been produced on CBC’s Alberta Anthology and his poetry and short stories have been published by several journals in western Canada. As a playwright and as a member of One Yellow Rabbits Performance Theater’s writing team he has had several plays professionally produced and have earned recognition for his work including a play-writing award from Alberta Culture for co-writing the critically acclaimed Juggler on a Drum. A book of poetry entitled The Last Six Minutes of Elvis was published by Touchwood Press in 2002. In the fall of 2007 Bravo aired a half hour special of his life as a poet and clown. He Just returned from the Banff Leighton Artist Colony where he finished a manuscript called “Hotel on the Cliffs of the Heart”. Kirk recently won the won the Alberta Screenwriters Award for the screenplay "Shadow Makers."

Lori D. Roadhouse is a singer, performer and writer of poetry, fiction, erotica, travel, humour, lyrics and children’s fiction. Lori co-created the 2003 Writing Toward the Light Poetry Contest and Concert. She is a member of the Red Mile Revenge Poets, Passion Pitch Poetry, Magpie Haiku Poets, The Single Onion, and MOST VOCAL Poets, and founded the Hilltop Writers. Lori’s publications include: Calgary Stroll of Poets 2002-2006 Anthologies, Onion Soup CD and Onion Jam chapbook, Spiritual Directions website, and a regular monthly poetry column in the Radiant Lights eMagazine. She has performed on VoicePrint, CKXU and CJSW radio and recently at the 1111 Art Event and the Taboo Naughty But Nice Show. Lori was a featured poet at South Country Fair 2008 and will be featured and MCing there again this year. She was recently a featured poet with the Canadian League of Poets’ National Poetry Month Western Tour, the Calgary International Spoken Word Festival, and the Flywheel Reading Series. Lori currently has two manuscripts of poetry being considered for publication.

Rael Xavier Bischoff graduated with a degree in English Literature from St. Mary’s University in South Calgary. Rael is a poet’s poet, paying high attention to the value of the written word, honoring both the ritual and craft of writing. His most recent manuscript, “Flying Information”, uses formal innovation and skilled word play to investigate theology and challenge the lyric. His work strikes a fine balance between tradition and the new, forming a bridge between conventional style and the ever present need for change. Rael is actively engaged with Calgary’s literary scene and has the awful character defect of taking poetry altogether too seriously.

An Onion Phonation

2009-05-04T21:17:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion presents Phonation, a poetry experience featuring

T. Anders Carson, Christian Hannigan, and Morley Tuttle.

The readings will be preceded by an open mic; four artists will be selected by a draw from the sign-up list and have five minutes each to perform.

WHEN: Thursday, May 21, at 7:00 p.m. [Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:15]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS: T. Anders Carson, Christian Hannigan, Morley Tuttle

MC: Vivian Hansen

BIOGRAPHIES:

T. Anders Carson has been published in 29 countries. His work has appeared on such diverse broadcasts as NPR, local University radio stations, Swedish Provincial Radio and the CBC. In 2000, he had a residency at The Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico. He has published two books of poetry: A Different Shred of Skin and Folding the Crane. He is currently working on his 3rd collection of poems, tentatively titled This Side UP. He lives in a small village with his wife and two kids by a lake.

Christian Hannigan emerged on to the poetry scene in Vancouver in the late ‘90s, having secured a bartender’s job at Bukowski's Bar and Bistro on Commercial drive. At that point he wrote and published a collection of poetry called, "DAYS ARE BUTTERFLIES AND NIGHTS ARE MOTHS." Christian was interviewed, and subsequently published, by The Vancouver Sun and again in The National Post after they picked up the story. During that time he organized shows and read extensively alongside poets such as Andrea Thompson, Shane Koyczan, Patrick Lane, Bud Osborne, Lorna Crozier and many more. In the last year, Christian completed another poetry manuscript titled, "And the Music Will Carry Us Through," currently being considered for publication by B House publications. He is a waiter at the Vintage Chop House and Tavern, on his final level to become a Sommelier, which should be completed in June. He is currently writing a couple of serial articles for Calgary's VM magazine.

Morley Tuttle on Google: From Morlaix, in Brittany, France, and derived from the Welsh or British word mor, the sea, and ley, a valley. It is situated near the sea, on a river of the same name. Manufacturer of distortion, echo, volume and wah pedals. A singer of jazz, rock and gospel in New York City. the Michelson-Morley experiment, an English composer, theorist, editor and organist of the Renaissance, a barman who was fatally attacked by a group of youths near Waterloo Station in London, author of Healing Our World: Inside Doctors Without Borders, A new Horizon in fire detection systems, Morley's trisector theorem states that in any triangle, the three points of intersection of the adjacent angle trisectors form a hard-right into the Township of Morley, Morley Bad Horsie.

April Poetry Frenzy

2009-03-25T20:42:00.000-07:00

The Single Onion and the Calgary International Spoken Word Festival present a Southern Alberta Poetry Orgy, featuring readers from Most Vocal Poetry Society of Lethbridge, Calgary’s Single Onion Series, B House Publications, Red Mile Revenge, and Filling Station Flywheel. A truly unique and auspicious night of poetry!

WHEN: Thursday, April 16th. Doors at 7:00 p.m. (Open Mic Sign-Up Cut-Off at 7:15)

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS:

SINGLE ONION: Kirk Miles, David Martin

B HOUSE PUBLICATIONS: Stephanie Davis

RED MILE REVENGE: Jude Dillon

MOST VOCAL: Blaine Greenwood, Richard Stevenson

FILLING STATION FLYWHEEL: Gina Dragpiper

MC: Lori D. Roadhouse

ORGANIZATION BACKGROUNDS:

Filling Station is a locally-created, nationally-distributed literary and arts magazine. It is a not-for-profit magazine run entirely by volunteer members of Calgary's literary community at large. Flywheel is one of Calgary's longest running poetry reading series and takes place on the First Thursday of each month at Pages Books on Kensington at 7:30 pm. Gina Dragpiper (aka Brent Schaus) is a recent Calgary transplant originally from Montreal, and is now Assistant Fiction Editor.

B House is an independent Calgary-based Publisher with a mission: to challenge the traditional, established model of publishing, specifically encourage new and previously unpublished artists, foster new ways of thinking and communicating in print, support experiments in style and aesthetics, and support the growth of a strong, diverse and vibrant arts community in Western Canada by facilitating the networking of writers, publishers, printers, and the public.

Red Mile Revenge! came about in December 2005 as an exclusively open-mic opportunity for poets and wannabes to share their work in a friendly space. Proving that sports fans aren’t the only ones who can engage in shameless debauchery in celebration of their passions, Red Mile Revenge! provides a welcoming and completely uncensored gathering place for page poets, slammers, authors, singers, and anyone else who wanders in. Host and founder Selina Clary is the ringleader of the lunacy, and she invites all comers to Tubby Dog first Tuesdays of the month at 7:30.

Most Vocal is a Lethbridge-based professional reading series with a primary focus on the oral presentation of poetry. From the page to the state, MOST VOCAL is dedicated to the promotion of poetry and other literary and performing arts in Southern Alberta. In partnership with Single Onion, Most Vocal and Single Onion receive funding from the Canada Council for the Arts and the League of Canadian Poets to present poets from all over Canada.

Single Onion was formed in fall 2000 by Fred Holliss, Sheri-D Wilson, T. Crane, and Kirk Miles to provide a professional poetry reading series in Calgary. Single Onion is now Calgary’s longest running spoken word series celebrating its 60th event tonight! Through volunteer efforts, local sponsors such as the Marquee Room and Brew Brothers, public donations, and organizations such as The League of Canadian Poets and Canada Council for the Arts, as well as our funding partnership with Most Vocal, Single Onion – held every third Thursday at 7:00 here at Marquee Room – provides a space for Calgarians to engage in Canadian Poetry free of charge and compensate artists for their contribution to the literary community.

Onion Ultrasonics

2009-03-13T19:50:00.000-07:00

The poetry of Paul Marshall and David Martin.

The readings will be preceded by an open mic: four artists will be selected by a draw from the sign-up list and have five minutes each to perform.

WHEN: Thursday, March 19th, at 8:00 p.m. [open mic sign-up cut-off at 7:45]

WHERE: Marquee Room, 2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen, 612 - 8 Avenue SW

COST: Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and the Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS: Paul Marshall and David Martin

MC: Patrick Horner

BIOGRAPHIES:
David Martin is a writer and teacher in Calgary. His poems have appeared in several literary journals, such as The Fiddlehead, Event, and dANDelion, as well as the anthology Jane Austen Sings the Blues (University of Alberta Press). His long poem "Bitumount Debitage" was shortlisted for the 2008 CBC Literary Awards.

Paul Marshall is a beat box parcel. Formerly an astronaut, he walks out his door and looks on to outer space and writes poems about it. When he fishes he just reached into the water. He likes to spend afternoons slicing up lemons and staying dialed in. An advocate of democracy and interesting newspapers, Paul is a buried piano in heat moving around you in perfect circles.

Onion Modulation

2009-02-03T09:28:00.000-08:00

The Single Onion presents: MODULATION, a poetry experience with Vivian Hansen, Tyler Perry, Angela Waldie, and Dale Herrington.

The readings will be preceded by an open mic: four artists will be selected by a draw from the sign-up list and have five minutes each to perform.

WHEN: Thursday, February 19th, at 8:00 p.m. [Open Mic sign-up cut-off at 7:45]

WHERE:
Marquee Room
2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen
612 - 8 Avenue SW
(403) 265-0123

COST:
Free due to our sponsors: The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and the Canada Council for the Arts.

FEATURED POET: Vivian Hansen
LOCAL POETS: Tyler Perry and Angela Waldie
ONION POET: Dale Herrington
MC: Paul Marshal

BIOGRAPHIES
Vivian Hansen's poetry and prose has appeared in many Canadian journals. She was a featured artist in the 2005 Spoken Word Festival. Her book of poetry "Leylines of My Flesh", describes the experiences of Danish immigrants to western Canada. Birds and Stone Theatre produced a play from her work: Angel Alley, Jack the Ripper's victims. Her most recent work "A Bitter Mood of Clouds" is a performance long poem about trans-gendered Arne Petersen, the recipient of one of the first sex-reassignment operations in Denmark.

Tyler Perry is a junior high school teacher in Calgary, and a creative writing student at the U of C. Much of his writing is inspired by his work as a teacher. He has performed his poetry at Pages in Kensington, and his poems have appeared in The Prairie Journal, NoD Magazine, and The Gauntlet. He will soon be working on his MFA in Creative Writing at UBC, and is grateful to the Alberta Foundation for the Arts for their financial support of his current writing project, a book-length manuscript of teacher poems, as well as to his students, for driving him to write poetry. He and his wife have a one-and-a-half-year-old son.

Angela Waldie is a PhD candidate at the University of Calgary, where her research focuses on portrayals of species extinction in contemporary Canadian and American literature. As she has lived in four cities during the course of her studies, much of her poetry addresses issues of displacement and a shifting landscape of ‘home.’ Angela looks forward to participating in the Writing Studio at the Banff Centre for the Performing Arts this coming May, where she will work on a manuscript that focuses on seeking a sense of belonging in Calgary. When not reading, writing, or teaching, Angela can be found exploring hot springs, river trails, farmers’ markets, and dance studios.

Dale A Herrington lives in Calgary, reads and writes in Calgary. Dale has one published collection, mythos, majiks and crossroads, as well he has had his poetry featured on CKXU "not your mother’s poetry.” His work has also appeared in dANDelion magazine, and the storytellers, stroll of poets anthologies. Currently Dale is in production of a spoken word poetry podcast that can be found at www.calgaryspokenword.podbean.com.

Single Onion happens the third Thursday of the month, ten times a year.
Our event schedule can always be found at:

www.thesingleonion.blogspot.com

House of Blue Skies – Call for Submissions

2009-01-25T20:44:00.000-08:00

Announcing a call for submissions for a new anthology, Home and Away – a sequel to the bestselling Writing the Land: Alberta Through its Poets, first published in 2007 and now in its third printing.

House of Blue Skies is seeking poems by Alberta and Alberta-based writers that explore our complex relationship with working on, living with, exploiting and protecting our land and our home.

Our land and its resources have shaped and continue to influence the history, culture, and economy of Alberta. From the route to the Klondike to the first oil wells to the building of the infamous Alaska Highway, from the sugar beet fields in the south to the Peace Country "bread basket" of wheat in the Dirty '30s, the bounty of the land has inspired and wooed, provided great riches and broken our spirits, driven our history with cycles of boom and bust, immigration, settlement and emigration.

We are looking for poems by the people who define these stories of "Home and Away".

From the soldiers overseas or the families waiting here at home; from the consultants and geologists who explore the foothills of the Rockies or the trappers who work those same mountains; from urbanites who find themselves working in a small town (or vice versa); from the families who have farmed their land for a few generations to the migrant workers who "come from away" and stay only as long as there is a paycheque; from the amazing mosaic of our immigrants over the decades to our enduring First Nations peoples – our sense of place and home define who we are.

How are we shaped by what we do and where we live? How does what we do effect our sense of place? What is home – is it where you live to earn a living… or is it where you are from? Can you go back home after years of being away? Does the landscape get in under your skin – do you carry it with you when you go? How do the seasons play a role in our lifestyles and our choices?

Categories may include the armed forces, farming, the oilpatch, forestry, silviculture, immigration, emigration, life on and off the Reserve, home as compass, homesickness, wanderlust… and anything else conjured by the words "Home and Away".

As with our previous venture, Angela Kublik's blue skies poetry e-zine will feature work by our selected poets on the theme of "Home & Away" throughout the month of September 2009. The poems selected will be included in an anthology to be released in the fall 2009. Book launches will be held in various locations throughout Alberta. Each contributor will receive two copies of the anthology.

To submit your work, email 1-3 poems, 50 lines maximum each, with "Home & Away" in the subject line, to akublik@blueskiespoetry.ca. Please include a short biographical note, as well as your mailing address and home phone number. Work should not be previously published or submitted elsewhere. Submission deadline is March 31, 2009.

For those of you who do not live in Alberta permanently, we trust that you will enjoy reading the work that results from this project.

Angela Kublik and Dymphny Dronyk
Publishers, House of Blue SkiesEditors, "Home & Away" Projectblueskiespoetry.ca
dymphny@telus.net

Onion Futurology

2009-01-03T12:07:00.000-08:00

Single Onion presents an evening of poetry experience with three foretelling Calgary writers followed by the fantastic Marquee Songwriters Showcase.

WHEN: Thursday, January 15th, at 8 p.m.

WHERE: Marquee Room
2nd Floor, Uptown Stage and Screen
612 - 8 Avenue SW, 403-265-0123

COST: Free due to our sponsors The Marquee Room, Brew Brothers, The League of Canadian Poets, and Canada Council for the Arts.

THE READERS:

FEATURE POET: Tom Wayman
LOCAL POET: Marie Specht
ONION POET: Patrick Horner

BIOGRAPHIES:

Tom Wayman's latest collection of poems, his seventeenth since 1973, is High Speed Through Shoaling Water (Harbour, 2007). His latest critical book is Songs Without Price: The Music of Poetry in a Discordant World, based on a lecture he gave as the 2007 Ralph Gustafson Poetry Chair at the University of Vancouver Island (Institute for Coastal Research, 2008). Wayman lives in the Selkirk Mountains of southeastern B.C., and teaches at the University of Calgary. He also serves as president of the board of Sheri-D Wilson's Calgary International Spoken Word Festival.

Marie Specht is a Calgary based poet, teacher, and artist. She currently teaches art and English to teens at Vincent Massey Jr. High and loves every second of it. She firmly believes in spontaneous acts of reckless beauty and art. Marie is easily identifiable as she is often seen sporting singed eyelashes due to her habit of clumsy-play with a burning ring of fire. Marie has an extensive tutu collection despite her lack of dance training; she believes in the power of dress-up. She has participated in various poetry readings from Canmore to Edmonton to a dusty-desert stage in the cacophonous Nevada salt flats. These days she can be found reading her poetry at Passion Pitch, the Red Mile Revenge and the occasional slam here in Calgary.

Patrick Horner is a writer and engineer. He was a founding organizer for the Red Deer Writers Festival. His fiction and poetry have been published in dANDelion, Crossing Place, and The Prairie Journal.

Single Onion happens (usually) the third Thursday of the month, ten times a year.

Hot Sundae Launch!

2008-11-07T18:20:00.000-08:00

Sunday, November 16, 2008
7:30 PM
Marquee Room
610 - 8th Avenue SW (in Uptown Theatre building)

A Filling Station Magazine launch, Single Onionʼs Annual Poetry Orgy, renowned surrealist author Stuart Ross (Toronto), and Musicians Travis Murphy & Heat Ray - together in one bowl!

Sunday November 16: Hot Sundae Launch! Filling Station Magazine Launch and Single Onion Poetry Orgy with readers from 7 local poetry groups, Stuart Ross (Toronto) and music from Travis Murphy and Heat Ray. 7:30 p.m., Marquee Room.

Filling Station, the locally created, nationally distributed literary and arts magazine, launches Issue 42. Single Onion Poetry Societyʼs Annual ʽPoetry Orgyʼ brings surrealist author Stuart Ross from Toronto together with readers from 7 different local poetry groups: Most Vocal, Red Mile Revenge, dANDelion, Magpie Haiku Poets, Calgary SLAM!, Passion Pitch Poetry and NoD Magazine. Up and coming indie rock darlings Heat Ray, including members of beloved band Hot Little Rocket, put a cherry on top of the evening, with support from visual-artist-come-musician Travis Murphy. Donʼt miss this sinfully delicious evening!

Sponsors:

Filling Station gratefully acknowledges the support of The Canada Council for the Arts, The Alberta Foundation for the Arts and Calgary Arts Development Authority.
Single Onion thanks The Canada Council and Brew Brothers.
Everyone involved thanks The Marquee Room.

Professional Sound Provided By: Kristoffer Benoit

For media requests, please contact:

Laurie Fuhr, Managing Editor
Filling Station Magazine
403-999-2566
meditor.fs@gmail.com

Fundraiser Update: Guest Reader

2008-09-04T16:00:00.000-07:00

There's now one more fantastic reason to attend the Single Onion Fundraiser. We have a special guest reader: George Amabile.

"What matters is the writing, not why you do it."

George Amabile has published poetry, fiction, and non-fiction all over the globe, in over a hundred anthologies, magazines, journals, and periodicals. He is also a well-known editor, having edited books for Penguin, The Muses Company, and Libros Libertad. A winner of many national poetry awards (including the CAA National Prize for his work The Presence of Fire), Amabile has published eight books, the most recent being Tasting the Dark: New and Selected Poems (2001).

Join us on Saturday, Sept. 20, 7 p.m., at the Carpenters' Union Hall (details below) for a memorable evening of poetry, music, beer, door prizes, and the launch of a limited-edition chapbook!

Onion Jam - A Single Onion Fundraiser

2008-07-28T17:12:00.000-07:00

Calgary's longest running spoken-word series is hosting a fundraiser to support a space for both local and national artists in our city. The evening promises good music, good poetry, and an opportunity to engage and support community culture.

WHEN: Saturday, Sept. 20, at 7 p.m.

WHERE: Carpenters’ Union Hall
301 10th St. N.W, Calgary, AB

COST: Tickets are $5.00 in advance and $10.00 at the door.

Advanced tickets can be purchased at Pages Book Store in Kensington and Megatunes on 17th Ave SW.

ENTERTAINMENT: Musical entertainment by the Pine Tarts

DOOR PRIZES: Fabulous prize packages from B House Publications, Frontenac House, Albertaviews Magazine, A Touch of Italy, and Bird Dog Video.

SPONSORS: Brew Brothers, B House Publications, Frontenac House, Albertaviews Magazine, A Touch of Italy, and Bird Dog Video sponsor this event.

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS:
To mark the occasion of the event, The Single Onions will be launching a chapbook at Onion Jam 2008. All artists are encouraged to submit original works of poetry (1 to 3 poems, up to 60 lines total), and visual art. Please include a 30 to 50 word bio with your submission.

Please send submissions to:
singleonion@hotmail.com

Submission Deadline: August 23th, 2008

Single Onion happens (usually) the third Thursday of the month, ten times a year.

The Onion Wheel

2008-03-23T15:07:00.000-07:00

filling Station magazine and Single Onion Reading Series present:
flying Onion – Writing Also Lives Here!
(for April only, a collaboration!)

Readings by:
rob mclennan
Andrew Wedderburn
Paul Marshall

and

Music by the Jagatha Christies

Hosts: Emily Elder (flywheel) and Dale Herrington (Single Onion)

Thursday, April 3rd @ 7:00 pm
Prairie Ink Restaurant (McNally Robinson Bookstore – 120 8th Ave SW)

Move over, Juno celebrations… writing lives here, too! Join long-time literary players flywheel and Single Onion reading series Thursday, April 3, as they partner to show off the overlap between writing and music! As always, we are proud participants in First Thursday, hosted by the Olympic Plaza Cultural District!

This month, we feature Ottawa’s rob mclennan, current writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta. mclennan appears for Single Onion under the sponsorship of the Canada Council for the Arts. Onion Paul Marshall will join him on the McNally Robinson stage.

flywheel supplies the musical/literary talent this month, with Andrew Wedderburn of Hot Little Rocket fame heating up the stage, and local cult faves the Jagatha Christies bringing acoustic marvels to round out our unique celebration of Music Lives Here!

We all sing in the key of c-minor at the news of McNally Robinson’s closure. They have supported the flywheel reading series since our inception in November 2003. Their loss is a serious blow to the Calgary literary community.

PLUS: Don’t forget the flywheel prize draw, and the flywheel limited edition posters! Not only will attendees get to hear top-notch literature AND music, they’ll also have the chance to win swag from filling Station magazine and McNally Robinson Booksellers.

CONTACTS:
flywheel.fs@gmail.com

Next flywheel: May 1, 2008

Single Onion Fundraiser!

2008-03-18T19:36:00.001-07:00

EVENT: Calgary MultiArts Variety Show #4
WHAT: Another fast-paced variety show including bands, poets, theatre, comedy, and
independent short films brought together for a cause; and,
a celebration of Calgary’s imagination!
WHY: In support of Inn from the Cold Charity and Single Onion Poetry
WHEN: March 22 2008, 8:00 p.m.
WHERE: The Soda, 211-12 Ave SW
COST: $8 at the door

FEATURING:
Bands: Musk Cup (improv jazz feat. Chris Dadge & friends) and Gutterawl (rock)

Poetry: Lara T, Kirk Miles, Bronwyn Haslam, and Wakefield Brewster

Theatre: Swallow a Bicycle Performance Troupe

Stand Up Comedy: Col Cseke

Independent Short Films: Created or Curated by Garth Whelan

MCs: J.J. Powell & Laurie Fuhr