YOU should know- Kevin Coval

Kevin Coval is a real soul broth(a). Yeah, with the 'A' at the end. A real life Clark Kent parading around in a "regular guy" costume, all the while being a bad mutha-shut-yo-mouth. He's a poet, a spoken word artist and a youth advocate who's helped to facilitate some of the most exciting youth outreach Chicago could and should hope for. And more, much more. Often I meet people who inspire me and whatever words that I can muster up about them, second hand, fall short of how dynamic they really are. This is one of those moments. This is why I love Chicago. She pretends not to notice you and when you least expect it, throws you a wink.  

Kevin's work is a good meal too rich to eat quickly. And when he means to make you laugh you cant help but pucker afterwards. He's telling the truth and that tends to leave a bitter aftertaste. I want people everywhere to start living like this. Speaking and writing and telling and sharing and living the truth. In this moment in our history, when we are all so depraved and deprived, these are the rock-stars of our time. 

More on the Artist

Kevin Coval is the author of everyday people (EM Press, Nov.'08) and slingshots(a hip-hop poetica) (EM Press, Nov. '05), named Book of the Year-finalist by The American Library Association. Coval's poems have appeared in The Spoken Word Revolution and The Spoken Word Revolution: Redux (Source Books),Total Chaos (Basic Civitas), I Speak of the City: New York City Poems (Columbia University Press), The Bandana Republic (Soft Skull Press), Chicago Tribune, Chicago Reporter, Cross Currents, Crab Orchard Review, Rattle, 2nd Ave Poetry, The Drunken Boat, and many other periodicals and journals. Coval writes for The Huffington Post and can be heard regularly on National Public Radio in Chicago. 

Coval has performed on four continents in seven countries including; The Parliament of the World's Religions in Capetown, South Africa, The African Hip-Hop Festival: Battle Cry, Poetry Society of London, University of the West Indies in Jamaica, St. Xavier's College in Bombay, India, and four seasons of Russell Simmons' HBO Def Poetry Jam, for which he also served as artistic consultant. From Jan. 2006 to May 2007, Coval visited 26 states and more than 50 cities during the promotional tour for his first book, performing at over 150 high schools, universities, book stores, theaters, community centers and Union Halls around the country. 

Co-founder of Louder Than A Bomb: The Chicago Teen Poetry Festival, the largest youth poetry festival in the world, Coval is poet-in-residence at The Jane Addams’ Hull House Museum at The University of Illinois-Chicago and poet-in-residence at The University of Chicago’s Newberger Hillel Center, and teaches at The School of the Art Institute in Chicago.

to learn more about the artist go to:http://www.kevincoval.com/index.html

to support this artist visit: http://www.kevincoval.com/downloads.html