[Note from Jeffrey Compton: This is a guest Living Local post by Bob Dancer.]
I’ve been a fan of podcasts on www.themoth.org, which are dedicated to the art of storytelling. These podcasts feature true stories, told without notes, which actually happened to the storyteller.
A few years ago I heard of a group in Las Vegas that’s trying to get a groundswell of storytellers in our city to become an affiliate of The Moth. So I started participating. Every fourth Friday, we have a Story Slam at the Center of Science and Wonder (C-SAW), 1651 East Sunset Road, A111, beginning at 8 p.m.
I tell a story every month I’m in town and am the most frequent emcee of the group. It costs $10 to come and listen and if you’re sharing a 5- to 7-minute story, it’s free.
One night after the Story Slam in October 2017, someone mentioned that a man named Al Jensen was hosting a free lecture about getting speaker gigs. It was immediately following a Toastmasters group in Summerlin, which met from 12 noon to 1:30 p.m. at the Egg Works, 2025 Village Circle Center, LV, 89134. If you attended the Toastmasters meeting, the lecture was free. If you just wanted to hear the lecture, it was $10.
Being both frugal and of the “I’ve heard of Toastmasters for years and have always been curious” mindset, I showed up as a guest for the meeting and stayed afterwards for the lecture. I liked the group, plus the fact that they had a free after-hours information session four times a month. So I joined that Toastmasters group and have been active since. (There are about 90 Toastmasters group in greater Las Vegas. Each one has its own vibe and the one I chose may or may not be the one for you.)
As you may know, Toastmasters has prepared speeches, 2- to 3-minute evaluations of those speeches, and “Table Topics,” which is where you’re called up and asked to speak from one to two minutes extemporaneously. There are some minor roles where people can “get their feet wet,” so to speak, before standing up before the entire group and speaking.
When I joined, I told the members that I was especially interested in the practicing my evaluation skills and also Table Topics. I believe those skills will help me be a better teacher (I teach two 10-week semesters of free video poker classes at the South Point each year) and radio host (I co-host the “Gambling with an Edge” podcast, which is an interview show and I need to ask follow-up questions to the interviewees.)
Within a few weeks of joining Toastmasters, someone there suggested that probably Improv would be good for the skills I wanted to learn. So I started to go to Improv workshops. (I don’t always follow suggestions as readily as I’m doing in the blog. But sometimes I do!)
There are several Improv groups in greater Las Vegas, but in my opinion the two best ones are the Las Vegas Improvisational Players (www.lvimprov.com), which does a family-friendly form of Improv, and the Vegas Theatre Hub (www.vegastheatrehub.com). Both are good, as are a few others in town. I preferred the LVIP group, partly because it’s close to where I live.
After attending the Thursday night workshop there for almost eleven months, I was invited to participate in the monthly showcase, where people pay $10 to come and watch us perform. To me this is a blast for both the audience and the performers, and a good place to learn what Improv is all about if you’re not familiar with this type of comedy.
Don’t assume that if you join the workshop that automatically after eleven months you’ll be in the showcase. There have been workshop members who have been invited right away to join the showcase and others who have never been invited. There is instruction every week and it depends on how fast you pick up the skills.
I know this is Jeffrey Compton’s blog, but if you have any questions about Story Slam, Toastmasters, Improv, or free video poker classes at the South Point, feel free to contact me at [email protected]
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