Poetry&Words has opened its applications to poets and purveyors of the fine spoken word who would like to perform on its stage at Glastonbury 2025 this June.
Late last year (28 December 2024), the Poetry&Words Stage at Glastonbury Festival put out a call on their official website for “all performance poets, spoken word artists, stand-up poets, raconteurs, bards and wordsmiths”.
The expressively dynamic performance space at Worthy Farm is looking for applicants with something riveting, riotous, rigorous and generally resplendent to offer the audiences of the world’s biggest greenfield arts festival.
Potential solo act poet applicants should be able to perform short sets or low-tech shows of up to one hour — including performative, comedic, serious, thought-provoking, and lyrical shows.
Below we’ve outlined the application requirements, as well as a quick guide on how to apply before the deadline of midnight (GMT) on Thursday, 6th March 2025.
📢 Please Note
Although Poetry&Words is happy to hear from music acts too, please do remember that they are a poetry stage, and therefore, if you’re a musician looking for a place to showcase your work, please note that Poetry&Words isn’t for you, though there are many other stages on site you could consider.
☑️ Requirements:
- Excellent writers with their own unique voices who will engage the audience.
- Experienced performers who can cope with an audience that will likely ebb and flow as the festival calls them.
- Poets with enough material for 2x25min family-friendly sets or 1×1 hour show. (Family-friendly means not full of sex, violence or swearing, not that they’re looking for kids’ poets or that you can’t be hard-hitting.)
- People who can commit to being on site from the Thursday afternoon to the end of their second set.
- Solo or duo acts (no collectives).
- Quick and simple stage setups — Poetry&Words can generally accommodate backing tracks, provide monitors, vocal and instrument mics, and setups that take 5-10 minutes max.
🗳 How to apply:
- Video yourself performing your work and upload 3 clips (ideally live recordings in front of an audience) to YouTube (or similar).
- Send those 3 video web links of your performances, in addition to your info (name + email address), and a well-crafted paragraph writing about your performance experience (150-350 words) to [email protected] — before the deadline of midnight (GMT) Thursday, 6th March 2025.
- Poetry&Words will then review all applications and contact successful applicants.
Located within the Theatre & Circus area and featuring approximately 400 acts presenting around 1,500 shows spread across three beautiful fields of wonder, the Poetry&Words Stage features some of the most fun, innovative, inspiring, and challenging poetry sets you will find anywhere around the world, alongside a new Spoken Word Theatre which made its debut at the Festival last year, while showcasing some lesser-known superb spoken word theatre shows.
Line-up and rumours
Last month, Neil Young was announced as the first headliner for Glastonbury 2025 after he initially pulled out of the festival due to it being “a corporate turn-off”. The Canadian-born singer, songwriter icon said: “We were told that BBC was now a partner in Glastonbury and wanted us to do a lot of things in a way we were not interested in.”
However, Young then backtracked on these remarks shortly afterwards, acknowledging that there had been “an error in the information received”. “Happily, the festival is now back on our itinerary and we look forward to playing! Hope to see you there!” he wrote.
Meanwhile, Rod Stewart was announced for this year’s coveted Legend Slot late last year, while Nile Rodgers accidentally let it slip that he and Chic are set for a performance at Glastonbury 2025.
Although no other acts have been announced as of this moment in time, speculation about who might play the legendary festival is always very high, and with the summer’s event fast approaching, the Glasto Rumour Mill is already spinning in full force.
The first line-up poster is usually revealed around the beginning of March, followed by the full line-up announcement sometime at the end of May (and a string of individual area line-up announcements in between). That said, many artists ‘self-confirm’ before the official announcements by divulging the news via interviews, social media or website listings to accompany the ever-growing rumours.
Some potential prominent headliner names currently making the rumour rounds include Olivia Rodrigo, Sam Fender and The 1975, to name a few — View our daily updated list of acts confirmed, rumoured and unlikely to perform at Glastonbury 2025 so far, by clicking here.
Ticket Opportunities
The Glastonbury 2025 Autumn ticket sales took place last November with the introduction of a new queueing system, which saw Ticket Plus Coach Travel packages and General Admission tickets sell out within 32 minutes and 40 minutes, respectively.
In addition to the upcoming ticket re-sales (expected to go on sale in the spring), some other opportunities for getting to Glastonbury include volunteering and working at the Festival, as well as entering competitions (once those options make themselves available).
Some past chances for winning tickets in previous years included opportunities from Brothers Cider, The Guardian, Vodafone, Time Out, White Claw, Tony’s Chocolonely & Oxfam, Chilly’s, Hunter Boots, Barbour & Oxfam, Co-op & Brooklyn Pilsner, and more.
The sold-out Glastonbury Festival is set to return this summer and will run from the 25th to the 29th of June 2025 in Worthy Farm, Pilton, Somerset.
⚠️ Bogus Operators
Glastonbury Festival would very much like fans to be aware that there are people out there who will try and sell fake Glastonbury tickets to unsuspecting, willing and innocent potential purchasers. Although Glasto-veterans who have been going to the Festival for quite some time may recognise these scams for what they are, newcomers might not.
Please do not risk falling victim to touts, bogus operators or fake promotions / contests. If you have doubts about any company offering tickets, accommodation or competitions to access Glastonbury Festival, please get in touch with the Festival office – And as always, remember that tickets are sold only on one site, which is glastonbury.seetickets.com
