POETRY vs. HIP-HOP St. LOUIS! 8/21 Lightning, Queen Sheba, Tasha Jones

🎟 TICKETS:https://citywinery.com/st-louis/events/poetry-vs-hip-hop-10-year-n1bja1📲 Facebook RSVP:https://www.facebook.com/share/18JcBQPS9W/

This Eventbrite Ad is to help get the word out. However, if you RSVP here AND purchase your ticket on the City Winery website, you can jump the line at the door!

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEContact: Blessing | PR Manager, Poetry vs. Hip-Hop®Email: [email protected]: www.poetryvshiphop.live

📍 St. Louis, MO📅 Thursday, August 21, 2025📍 City Winery St. Louis

ST. LOUIS, MO — After a decade away, Poetry vs. Hip-Hop® — the groundbreaking touring experience that has electrified stages from Boston to Baltimore and beyond — returns to St. Louis with purpose, power, and poetic vengeance. On Thursday, August 21, City Winery will become the battlefield for one of the most important conversations happening in American art today: Who holds the mic tighter—Poets or MCs?

Founded in 2015 by two Black queer women, Poetry vs. Hip-Hop® is not just a show. It is an offering. It is a cultural intervention. It is what happens when Spoken Word refuses to play second chair to mainstream music — and insists on its place at the table.

At the helm of this return is Queen Sheba — 2025 & 2024 Grammy-Nominated Spoken Word-Poet, professor, author, and the architect of this lyrical movement. She arrives in STL on the heels of her “HEALED PEOPLE DON’T ACT LIKE THIS” summer album and book tour, both up for Grammy® consideration in the Spoken Word-Poetry category. Her set will be joined by the mighty Tasha Jones, an Award-Winning Educator of the Year, poet-scholar, and one of the most intellectually rigorous artists in the country.

Hosted by STL’s own LIGHTNING, this event is more than a show — it is a reckoning, a reunion, and possibly a goodbye. As costs rise and support for independent arts shrinks, this may be the last time Poetry vs. Hip-Hop® comes home to St. Louis. And if it is, let the walls remember us.

In a world where truth is often commodified and authenticity diluted, Poetry vs. Hip-Hop® offers something raw, ritualistic, and deeply communal. Poets and Emcees battle not to destroy one another, but to build something unforgettable — in front of an audience that determines the winner with nothing but their voice, their presence, their joy.

The 6–7 PM VIP Meet & Greet offers attendees a rare moment of intimacy with the artists before the show — including a glass of grapes (we’re not trying to get canceled on the internet), a signed tour poster, early access to merch, and a photo with the cast. These aren't just perks; they're part of the ritual.

At its core, Poetry vs. Hip-Hop® is an act of resistance: against erasure, against silence, against the myth that poetry isn’t powerful or that Hip-Hop can’t heal. It is proof that we can bridge communities, genres, and generations with nothing more than a microphone and the truth.

So yes, we are “back for the first time.”And this time, we brought our whole story with us.

🎟 TICKETS:https://citywinery.com/st-louis/events/poetry-vs-hip-hop-10-year-n1bja1📲 Facebook RSVP:https://www.facebook.com/share/18JcBQPS9W/

📷 Social Media:@poetryvshiphop | @thequeensheba#PoetryVsHipHop #thequeensheba #HealedPeopleDontActLikeThat

📰 Previous Press:CBS Atlanta – “Poetry vs. Hip-Hop blends culture, competition & community in one night.”The Boston Globe – “Poetry vs. Hip-Hop puts artists to the test — and the audience decides.”Creative Loafing ATL, WERS Boston, Voyage ATL, Bay State Banner, The Patch

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🎟 TICKETS:https://citywinery.com/st-louis/events/poetry-vs-hip-hop-10-year-n1bja1📲 Facebook RSVP:https://www.facebook.com/share/18JcBQPS9W/

This Eventbrite Ad is to help get the word out. However, if you RSVP here AND purchase your ticket on the City Winery website, you can jump the line at the door!

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

City Winery St. Louis, 3730 Foundry Way, St. Louis, United States