SOMOS Presents the 26th Annual 

TAOS STORYTELLING FESTIVAL

Friday – Saturday, October 11-12, 2024

With Storytellers Dr. Raymond Christian, twelve time Moth award-winner, Regina Ress,  – best know for her Generosity and Grace: Stories from 9/11, and Cisco Guevara, Taos storyteller legend and owner of Los Rios River Runners, and a community storyteller selected from the Community Storytelling evening on Friday, October 11th which is curated by Taoseña and SOMOS Board Member, Olivia Romo.

Founded 26 years ago, The Taos Storytelling Festival has grown into one of the most exciting storytelling festivals in America. The stories you’ll hear will make you laugh, smile, cry, chuckle, wonder, slap your knees, giggle, and applaud. This year our community storytelling event will take place at the Talpa Community Center on Friday, 10/11/24, at 6PM. Dr. Raymond Christianwill lead a workshop on “The Art of Storytelling” at SOMOS from 10am-noon on Saturday, 10/12/24, followed by a free StorySwap from 2-3:30pm at Hacienda Martinez, with the main show that evening at 7PM at the Taos Center for the Arts (keep an eye on their calendar for ticket sales).

Make your plans now to attend the 26th annual Taos Storytelling Festival, October in beautiful downtown Taos. View schedule→

About

2024 marks the twenty-sixth anniversary of the Taos Storytelling Festival, sponsored by SOMOS. The inaugural festival in 1999, held in a tent in Kit Carson Park over three days, has evolved to a two-day festival with the main event on Saturday evening at the Taos Center for the Arts; auxiliary programs take place at SOMOS, Talpa Community Center, and other venues. The festival typically includes a community storytelling event, a Story Swap (free and hosted by a member of Storytellers of New Mexico), Storytelling-in-the-Schools, and an adult storytelling workshop presented by the headliner storyteller. Over the years, some of our featured storytellers (who have come from all parts of the United States and the world) have included Bil Lepp, Joe Hayes, Carmen Agra Deedy, Dovie Thomason, Cisco Guevara, Sarah Malone, Liz Mangual, Bob Kanegis, Kevin Kling, Terry Allen, Jo Harvey Allen, Antonio Rocha, Jerry Faires, Kuniko Yamamoto, Elaine Muray, Laura Simms, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, Andy Offutt Irwin, Two Worlds, a Native Theater & Performing Arts group, and Minton Sparks.

Dr. Raymond Christian

Ray’s stories have appeared in Readers Digest’s  Best Stories in America (2016) and  American Hero’s (2017) editions. He was selected as the 2017 Serenbe France Focus Storytelling Fellow (Atlanta, GA) and his stories have been featured on NPR radio shows such as The Moth Radio Hour, Snap Judgment, and Backstory as well as the Risk podcast, among many others.  As a competitive storyteller, Ray is a ten-time Moth Story Slam Champion, and winner of the 2016 National Storytelling Festival Story Slam. Sharing his stories across the US and Canada, Ray has made several appearances on Moth Mainstage, The National Storytelling Festival Exchange Place (2019) , and was part of the 2018 tour of Snap Judgment Live!

In 2018, Ray has been named as the best known story teller in the south by Bitter Southerner magazine. Glynn Washington, host and producer of Snap Judgement, calls him “a storyteller’s storyteller.”  He is distinguished for his exceptional accomplishments as a performer and spoken word performer and his training and experience as an educator and motivator.

Ray is currently the producer and host of What’s Ray Saying, a podcast that utilizes history , storytelling and commentary to provide a unique perspective on the African American cultural experience.

Regina Ress

Award-winning storyteller, actor, and educator Regina Ress has performed programs in Englishand Spanish across the US, Europe, Latin America, and India, in venues from Broadway to Brazil,grade schools to senior centers, maximum security prisons to The White House. In 2016 she told her program, Compassion, Generosity, and Grace: Stories from 9/11 for SOMOS. Her CD of New York stories won a Storytelling World Honor award, and she is recipient of two National Storytelling Network Oracle Awards. Regina teaches Applied Storytelling at New YorkUniversity. Find out more about her work at reginaress.com.

Cisco Guevara

Francisco “Cisco” Guevara guides white water raft trips on the Rio Grande and regales his adventurous passengers with stories of the wild.  He is a multi-generational New Mexican who came to Taos, he says, on the day he was born.  His stories draw on his Hispanic and Indian heritage and are “outrageous, but true.” He has been part of the Storytelling Festival since its inception.