Laura Gibson

Early life

Gibson was born and raised in the coastal logging town of Coquille, Oregon. She was classically trained on cello in her youth. Gibson's father died of cancer in her childhood. She attended Linfield College in McMinnville, Oregon where she completed pre-medicine requirements and competed for the Women’s basketball and Track and Field teams.

2004–2011

Gibson relocated to Portland, Oregon after graduating from college, and worked odd jobs prior to composing music. She began performing songs for patients at hospice homes prior to writing her first extended play, Amends, which was released independently in 2004. She released her debut album, If You Come to Greet Me in 2006 on the Portland-based indie label Hush Records. Gibson collaborated with The Decemberists's drummer Rachel Blumberg on the release, as well as on her second album, Beasts of Seasons.

Gibson performed at South by Southwest in 2007 to promote If You Come to Greet Me, and was likened by critics to Jolie Holland. In 2008, she appeared on NPR's inaugural installment of Tiny Desk Concerts . The concept for the Tiny Desk Concerts was convinced following one of her concerts, which NPR music journalists Stephen Thompson and Bob Boilen had attended, but they were unable to hear her performance over the noise of the crowd. Boilen then arranged for Gibson to perform at his desk at the NPR office, and it subsequently evolved into a recurring feature.

In 2009, she released a collaboration album wth Ethan Rose, titled Bridge Carols, which featured experimental vocals and was recorded in various outdoor locations.

2012–present

Her third release, La Grande (2012), was named after and inspired by the city of La Grande, Oregon, and received critical acclaim; Pitchfork wrote of the album: "Rather than another exercise in genre-dabbling and dilettantism, La Grande succeeds as a cohesive work thanks to the persistence of Gibson's vision. As a songwriter she's preoccupied with those timeless questions of the human condition, but seldom if ever stumbles into pretension or self-satisfaction."

Gibson has composed music and lyrics for multiple commercials, including a version of “Hey There Little Red Riding Hood” for Volvo, as well as original music for Microsoft and the Humane Society. In 2014 Gibson composed the song “Live Long in Oregon” for the Cover Oregon Campaign, the Oregon branch of the Affordable Health Care Act. The commercial was discussed on several national news outlets. After Oregon dropped its state run coverage, the commercial was parodied on the premiere episode of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, featuring Lisa Loeb in Gibson’s role.

In 2015, Gibson was principal composer and lyricist for Up the Fall, a musical production created for performers with developmental disabilities, for the Portland-based Non-Profit PHAME Academy. She has also collaborated with Oregon Ballet Theatre and Portland Playhouse. On April 1, 2016, Gibson released her fourth album, Empire Builder.

Personal life

In 2014, Gibson relocated from Portland, Oregon to New York City to complete a Master of Fine Arts in fiction writing at Hunter College.

On March 26, 2015 Gibson’s Manhattan apartment was destroyed in a gas explosion which killed two people. Gibson was home at the time of the explosion but escaped unharmed. A recovery fund, established by friends and fans, raised several thousand dollars.

Discography