The room in the Hatton Gallery in which the MerzBarn is located is
potentially great space, good in terms of lighting and also
(potentially) acoustically. However, by placing the reader's desk back
close to the MerzWall itself, we contrived to create a sound space in
which the poet's voice was lost in the ceiling space and some of those
beyond the first four rows had to strain for it at times. Shucks.
Better luck next time... But there - we hadn't expected to have to get
seating beyond row 4 anyway: as it was, there was a goodish turnout
(about 40) - hardcore poetry lags from Durham and Newcastle, and a
generous and encouraging smattering of art students.
Michael Heller read extensively from new work (collection
provisionally titled "Amongst the Capitals"), then from "Wordflow"
(new and selected, Talisman 1997) and "In The Builded Place" (Coffee
House 1989) - and back to new stuff; a good cross-section, and being
warned early of the acoustic he pitched it up nicely. He has a good,
proficient reading voice, with effective and graceful cadences and an
engaging tonal variation, and (I think) gave a good account of what a
poetry reading can be to an audience unfamiliar with them. With the
MerzBarn behind him, I was pleased to pick up all the references to
building, stone, made-things, humanisation & c which seemed to fit him
to the location better than my hasty prepared-on-the-hoof introduction
had done - but actually, on listening further, I found myself lost in
the graceful curves of Schwitters work, which seemed to make a good
counterpoint to the graceful cadences of Heller's reading. Human.
In the end we didn't spring the cups-of-tea act on audience or reader
(the MerzBarn was originally intended to become a teashop) but
potential future readers should note: the idea's been sown now, and
it's only a matter of time... MH said it was a great reading for him;
he sold all his books after it.
RC
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