2017 Poetry Out Loud Assembly

On Monday, January 23, 2017, the entire school gathered in the auditorium for our school's annual Poetry Out Loud Assembly. Upper School students from across grades daringly got up on stage and recited poems which they had selected and memorized based off the gargantuan list provided by the Poetry Out Loud Organization (poetryoutloud.org/poems-and-performance/find-poems).

Each student that recited a piece was first required to memorize and perform the piece for a member of the English Department staff, they then were chosen to perform at the assembly. During the assembly the students were judged by a board of judges (that sounds odd...) on a number of categories including physical presence, dramatic appropriateness, overall performance, voice and articulation, and evidence of understanding; scores were given in those categories, then they were tallied by everyone's favorite calculator, the great Mr. Holland. The highest scoring finalist in the school then is promoted to a regional competition where the process then repeats, several times over with the ultimate goal being that the competitor is able to make it to the national competition. For more information about the competition itself one can visit: poetryoutloud.org.

This year's judges were calibrated by Krystyna Keller '17, who recited an original piece entitled "Period". Ms. Keller was the recipient of the 2016 English Department Writing Award in Poetry.

During this year's assembly the MC was Jakov Schwartzberg '18 who graciously introduced each of the student competitors and provided dashes of humor when appropriate. The down time between the student competitors was filled with musical interlude provided by the River City Rhythms, composed of Nicholas Briccetti '18 on drums, Ian Dillon '18 on guitar, and Peter Philbin '18 on standard bass.Overall the atmosphere was kept light, cheerful, and flowing.

Above is a gallery of photos of the individual competitors as well as the calibrator, MC, and musical group. Below is the assembly's line up with the student competitor, poem performed, and poet. And beneath that is the video of the actual recitations of the poems in case you were unable to attend the assembly itself or would like to see a student perform again.

Poetry Out Loud Assembly Line Up: (click on poem titles to be brought to the poem's full text)

-Calibrator Krystyna Keller '17

-Period by Krystyna Keller '17

-Jael Fleurant '19

-One Hundred Love Sonnets: XVII by Pablo Neruda

-Maxwell Karpawich '19

-truth by Gwendolyn Brooks

-Damion Neth '17

-A Fixed Idea by Amy Lowell

-Ridge Gonzales '20

-The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

-Julia Tilton '20