Saturday, April 10: BONK! Sneaks In

It's coming early this month, and the Racine Public Library wants to make sure you don't miss a single performance, so mark your calendars! Saturday, April 10 from 6-8pm, the Racine Public Library will once again host "BONK!", the free monthly performance series that has quickly become an established entertainment event in downtown Racine. Now being held at the Racine Arts Council, 316 Sixth St., the series was created to expose the public to both local and nationally-recognized artistic talents. Each event showcases poets, writers, musicians, film makers and other talented artists. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. with seating available on a first come/first served basis. Each BONK! event features a short question and answer session with the artists.

April is National Poetry Month so BONK! will feature a great lineup of local poets beginning with NICHOLAS MICHAEL RAVNIKAR and followed by the participants in the first annual Racquetball Chapbook Tournament: William Allegrezz, Sandy Christensen, F.J. Berman, Melissa Czarnick, and others. Joining this BONK! poetry group on stage will be the unique "music hall" sound of THE SCARRING PARTY.

Nicholas Michael Ravnikar is the editor of The Bathroom Magazine and is a founding member of the BONK! Performance Series. His work has been published in Otoliths, Cannot Exist, boo: a journal of terrific things, and many other journals and magazines. Recently, he pioneered the Racquetball Chapbook Tournament which will have it's inaugural event on April 10, 2010. During this event, Poet/Athletes from Wisconsin and Illinois will descend upon the YMCA of Racine to compete in racquetball for the honor of having a small collection of their work published through a collaborative effort of The Bathroom Reading Materials and Friend of the Worlds, two local poetry presses. All participants will be sharing their work at this month's BONK!

Milwaukee quartet, The Scarring Party, perform tuba, accordion and banjo driven end-time music that draws on the influence of 20's and 30's music hall sounds, Lomax folkways recordings and 70's punk. In five years, the four-piece ensemble has attracted a growing audience and has shared the stage with a diverse range of acts, including Daniel Johnston, Polyphonic Spree, Secret Chiefs 3, Why?,Tilly & the Wall, the Ditty Bops, Margot & the Nuclear So and So's, and Southern Culture on the Skids.

Though the Scarring Party performances combine low-key showmanship with vaudevillian spectacle, the more confounding part of their aesthetic is the role of typewriters, 40lb cast iron bells, the theremin-howl of mandolins, unorthodox percussion and Daniel Bullock's warbling tenor delivered through the crackling Victrola veneer of a hand-built copper microphone.
outside of the confines of any era.
Local artists and performers are encouraged to consider sharing their talent/craft with the community via the BONK! series. For more information on how to participate or to view video of past performances please visit http://bonkperformanceseries.wordpress.com. You may also contact the Racine Public Library at 262.619.2571, Becky Spika at becky.spika@racinelibrary.info, or Nick Demske at nick.demske@racinelibrary.info.

BONK! is sponsored by Gary's Music World, Power Audio, the Racine Arts Council, and the Racine Public Library.