Calgary Poet Miranda Krogstad is coming to Chestermere as the featured artist for Word Up Chestermere Oct. 18.
“I’m pretty stoked to get involved,” said Krogstad, “I’m so glad that you guys are doing spoken word.”
Word Up Chestermere is a new spoken word poetry open mic event brought to the city by the Power Couple Team and hosted by Chestermere resident Arnold Henry.
“We felt like Chestermere was lacking events pertaining to performing arts,” said Henry, “we wanted to give a platform for the residents to showcase their talents.”
He chose Krogstad to be the featured poet based up a competition he judged that she was competing in. Krogstad was the only contest he gave perfect marks to.
“The way she used wordplay to connect with the audience was mind blowing,” said Henry.
“I truly believe that the residents of Chestermere will get to experience what spoken word poetry is all about, from a talented and creative young lady,” he said, “hopefully, Miranda can also inspire someone in the audience,”
Krogstad describes spoken word performances as the really pretty baby of drama, rap and poetry.
She believes that the uplifting tone to her poetry and performance is what sets her apart from other poets.
“I try to, in my poetry take a problem that I’m working through or a social issue and try to put a positive spin on it,” she said.
“It’s sort of a creative challenge for me to take life obstacles and the kind of heavier stuff and turn it into something productive and positive,” said Krogstad.
Her poetry covers a wide range of topics, everything from the political to personal.
“A lot of it’s personal,” she said.
A graduate of the Banff Centre Spoken Word program, she got her start in spoken word in 2013.
Since then she has performed across Canada and the United States.
Once Krogstad started performing spoken word she fell in love with the community she found there.
“I was totally hooked,” she said.
Spoken word poetry gives a deeper connection to the audience than any other way to publish poetry.
“You can see exactly how each line is hitting people,” she said, “You can see people nodding and going ya, me too.”
“You can’t get that, even on social media where you get the likes and social validation,” she said.
Word Up Chestermere is an open mic event, something that Krogstad really enjoys.
“You get to hear everybody else’s beautiful voice and get inspired by them,” she said.
The event starts at 7:30 p.m. at North Taphouse with sign up at 6:30.
