Dodge Foundation and NJPAC to Present Poetry Events in Lead-Up to 20th Dodge Poetry Festival

The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation (Dodge Foundation) and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC) will continue their 2024 Dodge Poetry initiative this summer, with a series of events leading toward the debut of the reimagined Dodge Poetry Festival this fall. This year marks the first time Dodge Poetry has expanded beyond the biennial Festival to include poetry programs all year in Newark.
 
Dodge Poetry—a collaboration highlighting poetry’s power as a catalyst for communities to advance social change—is committed to engaging with poets from underrepresented communities, including BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ poets and poets with disabilities. The festival will embrace poetry in all its forms and make deep connections with community partners to ensure poetry is accessible to all.
 
“Our focus is on a broader definition of poetry that includes spoken word and slam, and on opportunities to encourage collaboration between poets and jazz and hip hop artists, dancers and other performing artists,” says David Rodriguez, NJPAC’s Executive Vice President and Executive Producer. “Throughout our programming, we’ll use poetry as a lens to look at social justice and equity — because poetry has historically been, and continues to be, a potent agent of social change.”
 
At the launch of the partnership between NJPAC and Dodge Poetry earlier this year, Newark Mayor Ras J. Baraka, the son of famed Newark poet, playwright, and activist Amiri Baraka said, “The Dodge Poetry Fest coming together in Newark, all of us talking about equity and social change in this room, means we’ve made a few steps in the right direction. … When we write our poems, we can diminish what is ugly and raise up what is beautiful.”
 
Upcoming summer Dodge Poetry programming extends throughout Newark and offers opportunities for adults and teens to engage with poetry, celebrating it in many forms, from spoken word to printed verses.
 

Summer Dodge Poetry events include:

 
On July 20 at 7PM, the historic institution Nuyorican Poets Café brings an all-star lineup of poets — Edwin Torres, Emanuel Xavier and co-founder Lois Griffith — to NJPAC, with Nuyorican Poets Café Executive Director Caridad De La Luz “La Bruja” hosting. The second part of the event is a slam showcase with the 2024 Nuyorican Slam Team that opens into an open mic led by Newark arts organization EvoluCulture. (Tickets available here).
 
Beginning in mid-August and leading up to the Festival, the Dodge Poetry in the Community program, a partnership with Rutgers University-Newark’s Creative Writing MFA program and their MFA candidates and alumni, will offer poetry workshops for teens at Newark Public Library, MENTORNewark events, Centers for Hope, and other locations.  Select teen poet participants will be offered the opportunity to read their work at the 2024 Dodge Poetry Festival. Specifics on venues and timing will be announced shortly
 
NJPAC’s free outdoor summer concert series, Horizon Sounds of the City, will feature spoken word poetry readings beginning July 11. The lineup for the annual series,  which takes place Thursdays at 6PM through August 8, features Brazilian percussionist Cyro Baptista, with a reading by Hugo dos Santos (July 11); Ghanaian singer-songwriter and Fante rapper Kofi Kinaata, with a reading by Roberto Carlos Garcia  (July 18); New Orleans funk band Galactic featuring vocal powerhouse Anjelika “Jelly” Joseph, with a reading by Cynthia Manick  (July 25); rap icon KRS-One, with a reading by Patrick Rosal  (August 1); and queen of New Orleans bounce Big Freedia, with a reading by Mariah Ayscue at the epic finale (August 8).
 
GRAMMY®-winning musical visionary Meshell Ndegeocello — a composer, bassist, rapper, singer, producer and bandleader — will present words and music from her much-anticipated new album No More Water: The Gospel of James Baldwin, on October 6.  This concert, part of Ndegeocello’s continuously evolving exploration of her work as a writer-activist, will be part church service, part testimonial and part call to action — a genre-bending, multimedia invitation to reflect, revolutionize and transform.
 

2024 Dodge Poetry Festival
 

In the fall, the 20th Dodge Poetry Festival, which has been headquartered at NJPAC since 2010, will fill downtown Newark with poetry October 17 –  19. Over the course of 40 years, this event, the country’s largest poetry festival, has welcomed more than 150,000 people to readings, performances and more. This year’s reimagined Dodge Poetry Festival will mix spoken word poetry with jazz, hip hop and R&B at readings, performances, outdoor events and more. All are designed to inspire a community mobilizing for racial and social justice, repair, and healing.
 
Dodge Poetry will dedicate a large part of the opening day of the Festival — Thursday, October 17 — to programs on artistic and professional development. Simultaneously, the Academy of American Poets (curators of Poem a Day) will present a roster of events. The Academy’s Chancellors will appear in conversations and readings as part of the organization’s annual Poets Forum. That evening, the Newark-based spoken word poetry organization EvoluCulture will host a free open mic and mixer in NICO Kitchen + Bar, the restaurant in NJPAC’s building.
 
Friday, October 18 is Young Artist Day, which attracts thousands of teens and chaperones from all over the United States for in-person encounters with acclaimed poets.
 
On Saturday, October 19, ticketed events include a conversation with legendary musician and activist Joan Baez about her first book of poetry, When You See My Mother, Ask Her to Dance; and a musical performance from iconic poet Nikki Giovanni with acclaimed tenor saxophonist Javon Jackson and seven-time Grammy Award winner and NJPAC and Newport Jazz Festival artistic advisor  Christian McBride. Other esteemed headliners, featured on Friday and Saturday, will include Mahogany L. Browne, Tyehimba Jess, Claudia Rankine, and Sonia Sanchez.
 
In addition, the Festival’s final day will feature an afternoon-long family-friendly Poetry Fair in Newark’s Military Park, a Dodge Poetry Festival first. The fair will fill various corners of the park with poetry, music, face painting, drag performances, food trucks and more. Exceptional area poets will perform on an outdoor stage.