Who We Are
The Raving Poets were founded in 2000 by Thomas Trofimuk, Mark Kozub, Randall Edwards, Gordon McRae, and Michael Gravel. They’re a group of musicians and poets that stage open-mic poetry reading series in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. The core of the group is The Raving Poets Band, the “Founding Fathers” of the Raving Poets movement. They’re five guys for whom poetic and musical awesomeness is a way of life.
What We Do
As of 2008, we stage two reading series per year: one in the spring, one in the fall. The events are a democratic open-mic – no membership or secret handshake is required to participate. Sixteen poets take the stage each night and read one poem each to a maximum of five minutes. The world-famous Raving Poets Band provide improv music behind the poets.
Philosophy
The Raving Poets’ philosophy is not something that can be written. It is akin to a “feeling” and only hangs semi-translucent in the air on a Wednesday night when the band is ripping and the poet at the microphone is leaning back into the music and the two streams are in a gorgeous confluence.
Our philosophy floats in the underbelly of a word, or inside the fractured riff from a broken piano or at the tip of an impossibly sustained guitar note, or it rides along the surface of a hurtin’ poem spoken by an inebriated poet who could care less who hears her heart or if you happen to approve of what you find there.
The Raving Poets are who ever happens to be there to witness the moments, to be a part of a moment. The happy poets who read their stuff, the happy few who put their words into the air, the poets who stand at the microphone and risk. And it’s the bass guitar walking, and the crystal guitar, a funky beatbox beat, or the piano guy playing stupidly blind, or the sax man out of his mind, or a muted trumpet too cool for words, or any number of folks who show up to make the beat, the vibe, the soundscape to words.
So, we have no philosophy except that on any given Wednesday night at the Kasbar, we are often in our bliss.
Sponsors
We are proudly sponsored by Tammy and all the wonderful folks down at Yianni’s Taverna (Kasbar Lounge) in Edmonton.