09 September 2016

Ira Lawrence - All My Fake Friends

Ira Lawrence is an internationally produced playwright who inherited a haunted electric mandolin from his estranged grandmother in 2014. After releasing his acclaimed debut EP "Elegant Freefall" (Independent Clauses #9 Best EP of 2015), he left Brooklyn for the Philippines with his AustraliAmerican Theater Collective EVERYTHING IS EVERYWHERE (2 Aussies 2 Americans 2 gals 2 dudes 2 goys 2 Jews 2 legit 2 quit) to write, teach, and perform at Manila's Karnabal Festival of performance and social innovation.

While in The Philippines, Ira visited bombed out hospitals on the island of Corregidor, a sunken cemetery on the island of Camiguin, and almost got cast as a lead in a Filipino soap opera. MAPAGKAWANGGAWA, his debut album, is a self-recorded 11-song musical travelogue informed by Ira’s adventure abroad- exploring alienation from friends, the excitement of being immersed in a new culture, and America’s tenuous history with The Philippines (which at one point was on track to be America’s 51st state).


Ira’s theatrical work has been performed at The Kennedy Center, Flea #Serials, Samuel French OOB, Ensemble Studio Theater, Short & Sweet Sydney, Collaboraction (at the Steppenwolf Garage), F*It Club, Source Festival, Single Carrot, The Australian Broadcast Corporation, and The Chicago New Media Summit (among many other places around the globe). In 2006, City Paper voted Ira “Best Playwright Of Baltimore”. In 2009, Dated: A Cautionary Tale For Facebook Users was a New York Innovative Theater Award nominee for best short play. Ira has received playwriting grants from the Maryland State Arts Council and Chicago Union League.


MAPAGKAWANGGAWA is also a Tagalog word for charitable and philanthropic. So, upon the album’s release in Fall of 2016, one dollar of every album sale will be donated back to The Sipat Lawin Ensemble- the vibrant and audacious Filipino theater company behind Karnabal. The album was self recorded in Brooklyn at Ryan & Molly's apartment between Christmas and New Years 2015 and mixed and mastered by John Jagos aka Brothertiger in Greenpoint.

NO SYNTHS
NO GUITARS
NO DRUMS
ONLY IRA LAWRENCE'S HAUNTED MANDOLIN 




iralawrence.com

No comments:

Post a Comment

HeavyConnector.com - Music News

Collectible Vinyl Records for Sale

uDiscover

The Lunchtime Listen

Music-News.com

The British Invasion Revisited

Blog Full of Blues

when the WAVE was NEW

Americana Daily

Some Guy's Daily Rock & Roll Video Report

Beatles Daily News

Latest News - Pitchfork

The Hey Joe Blog

This Week's Find

HeavyConnector.com - Movie News

FirstShowing.net

High-Def Disc Reviews - High-Def Digest

The Old Trailer Park - Classic Movie Trailers

Some Guy's Rock & Roll Movie Collector's Guide

KindWeb is a worldwide portal for KindFolks containing a web directory, message boards, music resources, news, shopping, ecards, and more.

HeavyConnector.com - TV News

Bing News - Television

Google News - Television

HeavyConnector.com - Theater/Literary News

Theater

Broadway

Publishers

Bestsellers

Poetry News - Poetry Muse

New York Times Book Review

HeavyConnector.com - Animation/Comic News

Daily Toons: There's no toon like an old toon

Anime

DC Comics

Marvel Comics