Does my voice really sound like that?
April 17, 2013 3:59 PM   Subscribe

For this year's National Poetry Month, the Poetry Foundation has set up a SoundCloud group called "Record-a-Poem." They're inviting people to record themselves reading their favorite poems. (via)

Some of the Poetry Foundation's favorites:

Susie Asado” by Gertrude Stein, read by Fred & August Sasaki.
To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time” by Robert Herricik, read by
Garrison Keillor
.
The Crocodile” by Lewis Carroll, read by 1st grade students from St.
Giles School in Oak Park, Illinois
.
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens, read by Charles Morello.
‘Hope’ is the Thing with Feathers” by Emily Dickinson, read by Emma Rahme.

The Poetry Foundation's instructions for recording your own:

"1. Join SoundCloud and the Record-a-Poem Group.
2. Hit the round Rec (record button).
3. Check the box to approve that Flash can access your microphone.
4. Hit round Rec button again.
5. Record.
6. Hit the square Stop button.
7. Upload the sound.
8. Name the recording following this format: 'POEM TITLE' by 'POET' read by 'YOU'; add author tags and the word 'poem' and 'poetry.'
9. Keep in mind that we have to approve the tracks before they’re added to the group, so it may take a day before you see it."
posted by Rustic Etruscan (19 comments total) 17 users marked this as a favorite
 
Can we record ourselves performing our own performance poetry?

If not I'll stick a recording of Howl up there.
posted by Charlemagne In Sweatpants at 4:02 PM on April 17, 2013


*does vocal warmups*

Gene gene made a machine
Jo Jo made it go...
posted by jonmc at 4:04 PM on April 17, 2013


and now my reading from Audens' chorus of "The Flight into Egypt".

"Come to our well-run desert
Where anguish arrives by cable,
And the deadly sins
May be bought in tins
With instructions on the label.

Come to our jolly desert
Where even the dolls go whoring;
Where cigarette-ends
Become intimate friends,
And it's always three in the morning."

or my imprint of Gene Gene the Dancing Machine.
posted by clavdivs at 4:05 PM on April 17, 2013


so much depends
upon

a blue back
ground

glazed with white
text

beside the yellow
hyperlinks
posted by Renoroc at 4:14 PM on April 17, 2013 [5 favorites]


Yeah I might have added a "This is Just to Say" just, you know... because.
posted by Navelgazer at 4:24 PM on April 17, 2013


Still not making a dent in that $100 million.
posted by dhartung at 4:33 PM on April 17, 2013 [1 favorite]


Oh man, is there a way to hide this link from my future self? Because every time I drink too much when I'm alone, I have an potentially embarrassing tendency to declaim "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry."
posted by neroli at 5:04 PM on April 17, 2013 [2 favorites]


Some of the Poetry Foundation's favorites:

I can only assume the Poetry Foundation has not heard "Ubu Hubbub" by Christian Bök, as read by Christian Bök.

Caution: LOUD.

NO GAZEBOS GO BERSERK
posted by DaDaDaDave at 5:32 PM on April 17, 2013


Just shows where my mind is... a cursory glance read this as Record-a-Porn. Which -- let's face it -- would likely be more entertaining, except under certain circumstances.

Though the concept of porn being read by Garrison Keillor does have a certain "Wrong. So wrong!" appeal. Lake Wobegon has never been so caliente!
posted by markkraft at 5:43 PM on April 17, 2013


I would do this. I'm torn between Larkin's "Cut Grass" and Crane's "To Brooklyn Bridge."
posted by invitapriore at 6:51 PM on April 17, 2013


Sadly the only poem that I can consistently recall is one that my 7th grade English teacher had taped to the front of her desk. It's printed in 4-color "high" res over a photo of a horse running through a field of wild flowers:

September is a stallion,
With a flowing tawny mane,
Who has never known a bridle nor a rider nor a rein..."

I'm beginning to realize why the new school year was always so exciting.

[NOT STALLIONIST!]
posted by bendy at 6:57 PM on April 17, 2013


Can we record ourselves performing our own performance poetry ?

Not in a just universe.
posted by y2karl at 6:59 PM on April 17, 2013 [1 favorite]


Nothing by McGonagle. Sassenachs.
posted by Joe in Australia at 7:05 PM on April 17, 2013


Oh, man, I may have to go do "Crossing" by Philip Booth. I have to read (at this point recite) it to my train-obsessed preschoolers at least twice a day. Having read it so many times, I feel like I am ONE with this poem at this point.
... eighty-eight,
red-ball freight,
Rio Grande,
Nickel Plate,
Hiawatha,
Lackawanna,
rolling fast
and loose,
ninety-seven,
coal car,
boxcar,
CABOOSE!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:09 PM on April 17, 2013


Pretty credible renditions of two of my favorite short Wallace Stevens poems: "A Postcard from the Volcano" and "Re-Statement of Romance." The reader gets a word or two wrong, but I always do too when I read them aloud.
posted by whir at 7:53 PM on April 17, 2013


I recorded my favourite poem, Not Dying by Mark Strand (I read it here and have loved it ever since), on Soundcloud a little while ago because it makes me think of my Dad but it's too much to read to him. I've added all the tags and such. I hope it makes it on there, it's a good one.
posted by h00py at 4:32 AM on April 18, 2013


Here's the link, if anyone's interested.
posted by h00py at 4:41 AM on April 18, 2013


I'd read a Dorothy Parker poem, but I'm scared I'll start trying to mimic Jennifer Jason Leigh in Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle.
posted by koucha at 6:26 AM on April 18, 2013


Hmm. I appear to be too stupid to figure out how to record my own. I joined the group, clicked on the link in the confirmation email and now I can't for the life of me find a way to follow the instructions for recording. Oh well.
posted by Decani at 7:25 AM on April 18, 2013


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