The Wild Women

The Wild Women are invading Iowa City again! Yes, the former Iowa City institution is back and just as wild as ever. The Wild Women concert series started at Wild Bill’s Coffeehouse back in the late 1980s, morphed through the mid-90s and has resurrected because yes, the Wild Women are needed more than ever. Currently, the Wild Women concert team is comprised of Laurie Haag, Laura Hudson Kittrell, and Gayla Drake. Each concert showcases some of the finest of the area’s women performers, including but not limited to singer/songwriters, instrumentalists, poets, writers, and puppeteers. Get your Wild on and enjoy.

One Hundred and Change: Gayla Drake, Laurie Haag and Laura Hudson Kittrell have been
playing music together for a few years now, but it took an historic mid-term election for them
to come up with a name they could really love. Playing music from the political to the
personal, including several originals, One Hundred and Change will make you think, and
they’ll probably make you cry, too. In addition, these three artists are the central conspirators
in the current incarnation of the Wild Women concert series.

Miss Christine: In spite of growing up surrounded by cornstalks in the middle of Iowa, Miss
Christine Moad always knew that she wanted to be a performer. At the age of twelve, she
picked up the electric bass and has been hooked ever since. Raised on a musical diet of
psychedelic rock from the ‘60s and ‘70s, funk, R&B, and soul, Christine has assimilated these
genres into her own unique style of bass playing and singing. In May 2014 she received a
Bachelor of Arts in Electric Bass Performance from Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA.
She recently relocated to Nashville, TN and is playing with Georgia English and the Jukebox
Kids, Fabrizio and the Fever, Fawn Larson, and many others.

Jennifer McBain-Stephens: Jennifer is a writer who lives in Iowa City with her children and
works at a science journal. She grew up in the Midwest and went to NYU’s Tisch School of
the Arts, where she studied three subjects: Drama, English, and Journalism. She has also
lived in California, London, and New York, for various periods. Jennifer is the author of ten
poetry chapbooks and three full length poetry collections (“Your Best Asset is a White Lace
Dress” Yellow Chair Press (2016) “The Messenger is Already Dead,” Stalking Horse Press
(2017,) and “We’re Going to Need a Higher Fence,” (forthcoming from Lit Fest Press.) She is
also the author of a few non-fiction books from a long time ago when she used to work at
Rosen Publishing and Scholastic Inc. in New York City and she’d see Ric Ocasek on the
subway. She also makes collages and likes to take photographs.

Ashley Heffernen: Pianist, composer, songwriter and world-traveling ukulele junkie, Ashley’s
songs are quirky but never saccharine, romantic but always real. Often a travelogue or a story
of adventure, her poignancy grabs you by the feels and gives you epic wanderlust. She’s a
troubadour with an angelic voice, a sparkle in her eyes, and a wicked half-grin. She is fluent in
Spanish and carries a backpack with the coolest hammock you have ever seen everywhere
she goes.

Susan Gilbert: Susan Gilbert has been working in the theatre for 50 years, as an actor,
costume designer, director and playwright. She spent 20 years with the “Iowa City Community
Theatre” and went on to help found Coralville’s “City Circle Acting Company” (oops, sorry
“City Circle Theatre Company”). Her one- woman play “Catchin’ the Babies” was entered into
the Iowa Association of Community Theatres competition in 2007. The play won Best
Production, Best Actor, Best Set Design and Best Art Direction. Sue is also a Historical Re-
enactor of the Great Lakes Fur Trade Era – 1750’s and the Norse Culture in Dark Ages
Northern Europe – 975 CE. She teaches/demonstrates spinning, weaving, leather work and
herb lore of the time periods. She is a long bow archer, competes in black powder shooting
competitions and collects edged weapons. Sue’s misspent youth includes working as a tattoo artist, magicians assistant, Gypsy Fortune Teller, Wench at Renaissance Faires and Story
Teller. Her Husband can’t wait for her to decide what she wants to be when she grows up.