 | Paola Balbi and Davide Bardi are both trained actors and professional Storytellers, who combine their love and passion for the oral tradition with a sound stage experience. Paola and Davide share a precious long standing artistic partnership on stage since 2007 and the helm of Raccontamiunastoria Storytelling Company and the International Storytelling Festival of Rome as co-artistic directors since 2009. They are renowned for their unique style of tandem telling, bringing different points of views in each story and blending their voices with live music and singing. Read moreTrue to the Italian ancient Storytelling tradition and classic oratory (from ancient Greece and Rome), their performances are entirely not scripted and the text is improvised afresh at each performance on the base of a very deep research and knowledge of the story. Expert workshop leaders Paola and Davide have trained a whole new generation of emerging talents and young storytellers both in Italy, all over Europe and in the United Arab Emirates and have developed a Professional Performing Storytelling Training that has been recently endorsed by the Rome Three State University, becoming the back bone of the new Master in Performing Storytelling promoted by the University, a programme delivered both in English and Italian with students from 9 different countries in its first year.
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| Corin Raymond Corin Raymond is also a Juno-nominated singer/songwriter. His previous “bookish monologue,” Bookworm (2011), won Best of Fringe in Vancouver in 2012 “Corin has impeccable timing, and his performance is at once intimate, open-hearted and evangelical,” Vancouver’s Georgia Straight. His other storytelling-show, The Great Canadian Tire Money Caper (2015), tells how Corin and a worldwide-community paid for the making of an entire double-album (Paper Nickels, 2013) with Canadian Tire money. Corin has released 8 full-length albums, and he keeps his stuff in Toronto, where he lives with his dog Reese. “Corin Raymond is a storyteller who by the end of the night you’ll have known your whole life” – Brad Wheeler, The Globe and Mail. |
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| A versatile storyteller, Mariella believes in the power of stories to transform and inspire. She knows that stories connect us together, in the present but also to the past. Based in Toronto, Mariella’s stories - original, literary or steeped in the oral tradition - span the world, from Italy to Canada, Egypt to Brasil. Her rhymes and tiny tales enchant little ones while her own family stories speak of immigration, resilience and endurance. Mariella enjoys experimenting with narrative, and as such, collaborates with other artists from other disciplines like music, visual arts and puppetry. She has been collaborating with Italian Storytelling Group, Raccontamiunastoria since 2007. |
| Jacqui Du Toit is a multi-award-winning storyteller and artist, and the recent recipient of the Arts Ottawa Award for Outstanding Artist and Community Contributor. An international South African storyteller, arts educator, mentor, and activist, she is dedicated to empowering youth and women through the art of oral traditional storytelling. Read more
Rooted in the rich oral traditions of her heritage, Jacqui uses story as a powerful tool for healing, identity reclamation, and cultural connection. Her work is deeply informed by her South African ancestry and her lived experience, weaving together personal narrative, ancestral wisdom, and contemporary social awareness.
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| Since 1989 he has travelled the world, telling traditional tales. His repertoire ranges from profound Greek myths to magical fairy tales, thrilling adventures to absurd nonsense. He has performed at the National Theatre, Sydney Writers Festival, The National Storytelling Festival of America, The Getty Centre, many theatres, arts centres, festivals, churches and thousands of schools. Read more
In 2017 he was awarded the Hay Festival Medal for his services to storytelling. He has written several award-winning anthologies of traditional stories, including DARK TALES FROM THE WOODS.
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| Itah Sadu is an award-winning storyteller and children’s author. She is the co-owner of the iconic Toronto bookstore A Different Booklist, specializing in African and Caribbean Canadian literature. Itah is the Managing Director of the Blackhurst Cultural Centre - The People's Residence. She is a founding member of the annual Toronto Emancipation Day Underground Freedom Train Ride. Itah lives with her family in Toronto. |
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| Lenore Keeshig (Anungo Kwe) of the Wolf Clan is a storyteller and knowledge-keeper from the Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation at Neyaashiinigmiing on the Saugeen (Bruce) Peninsula. As a storyteller and cultural interpreter, she has been able to connect traditional Anishinaabe stories to current geologic research in the Great Lakes about the rise and fall of water levels, and likes to discuss “geomythology.” She worked for 24 years as a naturalist, providing education programs about the natural and cultural history of the Saugeen/Bruce Peninsula and the Great Lakes. Read more
Her book of poetry Running on the March Wind was published in 2015 by Quattro Press. Primarily an author of stories for children, she co-authored The Truth About Nibbles (2005) with her husband, Davidban McLaren; produced two bilingual children’s books, each illustrated by her daughter Polly Keeshig-Tobias: Emma and the Tree (1996) and Bird Talk (1991), which won the Living the Dream Book Award 1993 – an award commemorating the life work of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr. In 1988, Lenore and her husband Davidban McLaren received the Author’s Awards for an article For as Long as The Rivers Flow published in This Magazine.
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| 1001 Friday Nights of Storytelling Every Friday night since 1978, storytellers and listeners have been gathering in Toronto for an open evening of oral stories. Each Friday night is unique, and everyone is welcome to come and listen, come and tell. You might hear traditional tales, stories of personal experience, literary stories, original stories, ballads, or episodes from history, all told through the human voice. |
| Founded in 1997 by Rico Rodriguez, Queers In Your Ears is a collective dedicated to telling stories about being queer — stories that had long gone unheard. Focusing on original material, embracing vibrant, queer voices and perspectives, from personal histories to reimagined fairy tales, QIYE pushes boundaries and brings bold new dimensions to the art of storytelling. QIYE is a platform where our queer tales thrive, provoke, and inspire. |
| Clare Nobbs Clare has been telling stories for her entire life, getting herself both in and out of trouble more times than she’s had hot dinners. Clare loves to share traditional tales, including folktales from her beloved Yorkshire, but she's happiest telling personal stories and tales with a queer twist with the Queers In Your Ears crew - her storytelling family since 1997. Clare is eternally grateful to her early mentor, the late Helen Porter, for her enduring inspiration and encouragement. |
| Jeffrey Canton For more than three decades, Jeffrey Canton has shared folk and fairytales as well as original stories that dig deep into the strata of Toronto’s history and, with a little soft-shoe and a gay show tune or two, his own queer past. A long-time member of Queers in Your Ears (QIYE), Canada’s only 2SLGBTQIA+ storytelling collective, he’s appeared at the Toronto International Storytelling Festival and the Replay Story Fest. He’s currently collaborating on an exciting project with Big Pond Small Fish, Mammalian Diving Reflux and the Archives of Ontario. Jeffrey also developed “Voices Seldom Heard”, the first 2SLGBTQIA+ storytelling course focusing on the lives and experiences of queer tellers for Storytelling Toronto. |
| Rico Rodriguez Rico Rodriguez is a storyteller, story writer, drag performer, percussionist, teacher and Union Representative. He delivers highly energetic and participatory storytelling shows. He tells personal stories and folktales, fables and legends from the rich and diverse LatinX cultures. His stories are infused with equity and social justice themes. He tells in Spanish, English, and in Spanglish. He is one of the founders of Queers in Your Ears. |
| T.J. Banate T.J. Banate (aka the Noise Witch) (they/them) is a storyteller, artist, and art therapy graduate student, weaving stories from the strange, chaotic, and joyful absurdities of life. Through art, ritual, and a deep love of animals and nature, their work explores creativity, ancestral healing, magic and the wildness of being human. |
| The Parent-Child Mother Goose Program® is a joyful, physically close, and interactive program in which parents and their young children learn to share the power and pleasure of oral rhymes, songs, and stories. Originated in 1984 and still operating an active PCMG National Council with the shared goal of sharing the benefits of the Mother Goose program and workshops to more and more families everywhere. |
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