Raffi Cavoukian, CM OBC (Armenian: Րաֆֆի, born July 8, 1948), known professionally by the mononym Raffi, is a Canadian singer-lyricist and author of Armenian descent born in Egypt, best known for his children's music. He developed his career as a "global troubadour" to become a music producer, author, entrepreneur, and founder of the Raffi Foundation for Child Honouring, a vision for global restoration.
Raffi was born in Cairo, Egypt, to Armenian parents who fled Turkey during the Armenian genocide. In 1958, his family immigrated to Canada, eventually settling in Toronto, Ontario. His mother named him after the Armenian novelist Raffi. His father, Arto Cavoukian, was a well-known portrait photographer with a studio on Bloor Street in Toronto. His older brother, Onnig Cavoukian, known as Cavouk, is also a famous portrait photographer. His younger sister is Ann Cavoukian, Ontario's former Information and Privacy Commissioner. His parents died within twelve hours of each other, his mother dying first of abdominal cancer. He visited Soviet Armenia once in 1972.
In the early 1970s, Raffi frequented a Toronto guitar store near Yonge and Wellesley called Millwheel, where he met other developing Canadian musicians such as David Wilcox and John Lacey. He befriended Lacey, a folk guitarist from Oakville, Ontario, who helped Raffi improve his finger picking. Raffi continued playing folk guitar in coffee houses in Toronto and Montréal before hitchhiking to Vancouver in 1972 to find "fame and fortune".

Return to Raffi Autograph Profile