LAURA WOOD was born on Tina Turner's Birthday in Washington D.C., on November 26th. A true Sagittarian, she started performing in second grade on the piano, was taught by French Nuns, a Country Guitar player and Coffee House Performer in Virginia. She studied classical guitar in Belgium. She bought her first 12 string at age 12 while in Belgium. She had her first gig on a cruise ship at age 13 crossing the Atlantic, then began playing professionally at age 19 in Saratoga Springs, NY where she studied music at Skidmore College and performed at Caffe Lena. From there, she started a jazz improvisation band in Northampton, MA, and studied vocal jazz at UMASS Amherst. She was inspired to move to NYC and studied/collabaorated on Latin Percussion and guitar in Harlem with Harry Belafonte's percussionist, Monte Ellison, of Sergio Mendez and Brazil 66.
After too much city life, she moved to a cabin in the woods in MA and wrote lots of songs. From there, she became a nurse to support herself and then moved to Boston where she worked and performed in several clubs and coffeehouses.
She became an Acoustic Underground Finalist and wrote more songs, recorded several indie records as a percussionist and vocalist and finished her first full length CD at Signature Sounds in 2000. She has performed in many showcases for the National Folk Alliance in Nashville and Cleveland, Ohio. She has been performing and recording off and on in the Florida Keys since 1993 with several local performers. She has 2 more CD's that are nearing completion and hope to be out by the end of 2010. Her largest audience was performing with the Disco Diva Shannon opening for Gloria Gaynor at Mohegan Sun - 10, 000 people. Other big audiences were the Michigan Women’s Music Festival, and the The National Women’s Music Festival.
Her biggest thrills were playing congas with Ritchie Havens on "Freedom", performing on 12 String for the trains in South Station, Boston's 100th anniversary of the Red Line and onboard the Fury Catamaran for Key West's Sunset Sail. She is currently writing and performing in Key West, Florida at the Pier House, Pearl's, La Te Dah, and Blue Heaven's Carribbean Restaurant.
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