Buddy Wakefield is the two-time Individual World Poetry Slam Champion
featured on NPR, the BBC, HBO's Def Poetry Jam, and most recently signed
to Strange Famous Records (Ani DiFranco). In 2004 he won the Individual
World Poetry Slam Finals thanks to the support of anthropologist and
producer Norman Lear, then successfully defended that title at the International
Poetry Festival in Rotterdam, Netherlands against the national champions
of seven European countries with works translated into Dutch.
In 2005 he won the Individual World Poetry Slam Championship title again
and has gone on to share the stage with nearly every notable performance
poet in the world including Saul Williams, Sage Francis, Alix Olsen,
Derrick Brown and Utah Phillips in hundreds of venues internationally
from Comedy Central's Hudson Theater and Scotland's Oran Moore to San
Quentin State Penitentiary, House of Blues (New Orleans) and CBGB's.
In the spring of 2001 Buddy left his position as the executive assistant
at a biomedical firm in Gig Harbor, WA, sold or gave away all he owned,
moved into the small town of Honda Civic, and set out to live for a living,
touring every major poetry venue in North America through 2003. He still
tours full time while co-managing The Bullhorn Collective (a talent agency
founded by Wakefield, made up of 30+ of the most accomplished performance
poets alive), and considers his recent tours with Ani DiFranco the highlight
of his career thus far.
Born in Shreveport, LA, mostly raised in Baytown, TX, now claiming Seattle,
WA as home, Buddy has been a busker in Amsterdam, a lumberjack in Norway,
a street vendor in Spain, a team leader in Singapore, a re-delivery boy,
a candy maker, a street sweeper, a bartender, a maid, a construction
worker, manager of a CD store, a bull rider and a booking agent. Wakefield
is a growth junkie, an expert witness to the moon, avid player of marbles
in the trees, elated son of a guitar repair woman, wingman of Giant Saint
Everything, is void of S.T.D.'s, and remains generally hopeful for his
health despite an abusive relationship with free range pastry buffets.
Buddy, a Board of Directors member with Youth Speaks Seattle and member
of Team Seattle 2006 for the National Poetry Slam Finals is honored that
his work is published internationally and has been used to win national
collegiate forensics competitions. Also a member of Solomon Sparrow's Electric
Whale Revival, Buddy is known for delivering raw, rounded, high vibration
performances of humor and heart.
