About Me
A native of Gadsden, AL, Laura Dodd first knew she wanted to be a performer after seeing the musical, "Grease," and being inspired by it, at the age of 5, Laura began singing and practicing day and night with the determination to become a performer.Laura has performed in musicals, on television, and has opened for several internationally-known stars, such as: Maynard Ferguson, Sandi Patti, Patty Loveless, Josh Turner, and Rascal Flatts. Her first single, "WOW," charted at 54 in the MusicRow Magazine Country Breakout Chart.Laura is also very active with the VSA Arts organization, an international organization that supports artists with disabilities. As a result of her performances for and support of VSA, Laura won VSA's 2003 Panasonic Young Soloist's Award. In her tenure as Young Soloist 2003, Laura appeared at the Museum of Radio and Television, NYC for the Panasonic Corp in the Spring of 2003. She also performed at The Congressional Breakfast for Arts Advocacy Day at the Senate Building in Washington, DC.Both for VSA Arts and other organizations, Laura has toured extensively all over the country. May 2004 saw Laura playing the Nashville NARAS Grammy Block Party, sharing the stage with Country's A-list artists. In June 2004, Laura performed with Ben Vereen and Ronin Tynan in Washington, DC for the VSA International Festival at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. These performances were rapidly followed by Laura's performing at "Florida Salutes its Heroes" on June 5, 2004 to our National Guard personnel returning from duty in Iraq.Laura's steady rise to stardom was punctuated by her invitation to sing the National Anthem at the White House on July 12, 2004 for President George W. Bush. The performance opened a Little League game on the White House lawn, and Laura's silky voice and finely-honed control captivated the thousands of attendees at the game.Laura's increasing visibility and rave reviews has brought her the attention of the elite of both the music and film businesses. In the Summer/Fall of this year, Laura co-produced a debut acoustic album, with Tom Walker, the founder of The Digital Cafe Tour Entertainment (Digital Café Tour) and the mind behind Indie music powerhouse, Friday's Child. Together, Tom and Laura explored Country, Blues, Pop and Folk genres to sculpt a unique album that showcases Laura's vocal talents.In October 2004, Laura headlined Nashville's top songwriters' venue, The BlueBird Café. Subsequent to that, she also did several short tours of New York and New England clubs, Borders Books and Music Stores, and made Internet radio appearances, as guest of Friday's Child. She previewed tracks on her new album on CyberstationUSA.com to 10 million listeners and shortly thereafter made the top 20 Countdown on that network.On January 7, 2004, Laura opened for Friday's Child in the Digital Café Tour Internet Concert Series, which reaches 2 million dedicated listeners a month, and is sponsored by Taylor Acoustic Guitars. She also performed at Concern America's Benefit Concert to Aid Tsunami Victims at PD O'Hurley's in New York City on January 20, 2005, along with her fellow Digital Cafe Tour artists, Surrey Lane and Friday's Child. The event raised thousands of dollars for that cause.Her performances in the New York area led the prestigious, Luna Stage, a national equity theater in Montclair, New Jersey, to book Laura for a Women's Country Music showcase on January 30, 2005. She received rave reviews and feature articles in major area newspapers.On June 21, 2005, Laura opened for Bruce Hornsby at the Strathmore Music Center in Bethesda, MD for an ADA Watch Benefit Concert. In an unprecedented display of enthusiasm for Laura's performance, the audience responded to her closing song with a standing ovation. That was followed by her performance on December 19th at The Country Music Hall of Fame's prestigious Ford Theater. She shared the stage with members of the Music Mafia, and her set was explosive.Laura also recently had a supporting role in Darla Rae's "The Goal," an independent film dealing with the life of a quadriplegic rugby player. The film was recently picked up by Maverick Entertainment and will be released in theaters on Nov. 2, 2006.2006 was a great year for Laura. She played two video concerts for The Digital Café Tour Summer Broadband Concert Series which garnered over two hours of her pristine live performance. Visit www.digitalcafetour.com to see a few clips from her performances.In October 2006, Laura played two shows for VSA Arts at Country Music's hallowed hall, The Ryman Auditorium.Laura led off her 2007 schedule on March 23rd at New York City's Cutting Room, where she played to a sold-out audience and recorded her third, full-length Digital Café Tour video concert. On April 14th, Laura opened for Country music star, Doug Stone, in front of several thousand people at The Chocolate Festival in her hometown of Gadsden, AL.Look for full video Podcasts of Laura's Digital Café Tour video concerts coupled with documentary footage about her life and career early this summer.
