Cleveland Public Library presents a FREE and open to the public program "The Urban Experience Summit: Spoken Word," Saturday, July 19, 3:00 p.m., at the Martin Luther King Branch, 1962 Stokes Boulevard. It will be an afternoon of artistic expressions in words and music presented by some of Cleveland’s most notable native and transplanted sons and daughters: Kisha Nicole Foster, Maxwell Shell, ReGina Crawford, Mary Player and SWANK, Esquire Banks and the Shaw High School Student Poetry Collective.

            Foster is a Cleveland State University Student who was a member of the 2003 Cleveland Classic Slam Team and who was featured in the Writers and Their Friends performance in 2006 as one of the top 25 writers in Cleveland.  Shell is a young Cleveland poet and rap artist. Crawford is the owner and president of G Styl Productions, Inc., a founding member of Women Entrepreneurs of America, Inc. and a Call & Post contributing writer in addition to being a performance poet who creates all her own poetry.  Player and SWANK began performing their R&B/jazz/funk music together in 2004 and their album, “Swank-Ta-Fied!” is scheduled for a July release. Banks is a local visual artist/storyteller. The Shaw High School Student Poetry Collective’s poets have been featured in the Plain Dealer. For more information, call (216) 623-2822.

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