Welcome & Rules

Welcome to season 8 of VerbQuake, the UrbArts Youth Poetry Slam program. Teams are free to compete but must be sponsored by a school. Questions about involvement should be sent to verbquake@urbarts.org. For current teams, be sure to review the rules here. 

Event Schedule

Jan 13 | UrbArts | Team Bout, 4 pm: Beauty & the Beats v Slam Cats v Ill Noise v Savage Stanzas

Jan 21 (MLK Day) | UrbArts | Team Bout, 1 pm: Vap v Kanye’s Baby v Poetic Soulz v (TBD)

Jan 28 | Hazelwood West | Team Bout, 3:30 pm: Slam Cats v Savage Stanzas v (Kanye’s Baby)

Feb 16th | UrbArts | Tournament Preliminary, Sat at 12 pm

• Concrete Roses,
• Slam Cats, &
• Vap

Feb 22 | .Zack | Tournament Preliminary, Fri 9 am (+ lunch for competing teams)

• Beauty & the Beats,
• Ill Noise, &
• Kanye’s Baby

Feb 24th | UrbArts | Tournament Preliminary, Sun at 4 pm

• Savage Stanzas,
• Poetic Soulz, &
• Sumner

March 2 | UrbArts 6:00 pm Youth Poetry Grand Slam | $15 tix

• Vap (Central & Visual Performing Arts)
• Beauty & the Beats (Marquette High School)
• Savage Stanzas (Parkway North)

March 8 | UrbArts 6:00 pm Youth Poetry Slam Final Stage (Poets to be determined) | $15 adv tix

• Qualified Poets to date:
  • Zack
  • Camryn (Kirkwood)
  • Shadiya
  • K-Note aka Keana Fox (Collinsville)
  • Darius (CVPA)
  • Elle Wolf (CVPA)
  • Dominoes (CVPA)
  • Jessica (Hazelwood West)
  • Megha Sanjay (Marquette)
  • Caleb (Northwest in Cedar Hill)
  • Sarah Abbas (Marquette)
  • Brooklyn Beatz aka Amaya (Collinsville)
  • Kaylyn McCoy (Parkway North)
  • Charlotte D’Alfonso (Parkway North)
  • Mo-Mo (Grand Center Arts Academy)
  • Swervo (Sumner)

Founded in August 2001, our mission is to create platforms and platform creatives for youth and community development. The animating idea behind Urban Artist Alliance was the concept of “social arts,” where poets, writers, actors, musicians, and visual artists would create art that reflect the conditions and possibilities of their communities. This kind of art is not apolitical. It challenges, disrupts, and tells truth about society from the artist’s perspective.

Art is revolutionary. It changes things and people.

Think of the opportunities artists and arts organization create through their work. Imagine the dancer who instructs a dance class or choreographs a performance before an audience. The dancer would not be able to lead a class or be contracted to choreograph a performance if she or he never learned to dance. Therefore, possibility is inextricably connected to art. Possibilities follow from the art but the opportunity must be first given to the child who desires to dance. Without that initial opportunity, there would be no dance class led by that instructor or choreographed performance made possible by that dancer. But it takes more than the opportunity to lead a youth workshop for the dancer earn some income. It also takes platform to enable the dancer to fully self-actualize and become a model for her or his students.

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