MySpacea place for friends

Ivan began playing piano by ear as a child and started putting together poems and chord patterns soon thereafter. Inspired by the immortal rock and folk in his parents’ collection, 70’s and 80’s pop radio and the eclectic sounds and textures he heard in his aunt’s jazz club, Ivan got seriously into playing guitar and writing songs during his turbulent teen years and has kept at it since then. Over the years he has written hundreds of songs and developed his distinctive, emotional style on a number of instruments.

Since the mid-90s, Ivan has performed at a wide range of venues including: The Living Room, The Knitting Factory, St Anne's Warehouse, Triad, The Bitter End, Sidewalk Cafe, The Merce Cunningham Studio, St. Mark's Theater, Here, Synchronicity Space and many others. Ivan has performed at concerts, recitals, festivals, dance, comedy and theatrical events, city parks, bars, cafes, bed & breakfasts, restaurants, fund raisers, rallies, protests, parades, bar/bat mitzvahs, summer camps, schools, churches, synagogues, radio shows, train stations, weddings and parties around the Northeast. Ivan continues to play in a variety of settings with a number of different performers (folk, rock, world music, etc.), but his energy is generally focused on recording his catalog of songs with Ivan’s Dream Band, a truly high quality rocknroll collective.

Ivan's Dream Band is made up of a rotating cast of some of New York City's best musicians. Shows range from intimate trio performances to full scale acoustic-electric blow outs ...

Ivan has released three CDs (all available on cdbaby.com and at shows). His first release (self-titled) captures his band of 1995-1996 mostly live-in-studio. The 17 eclectic tracks include the fiddle-powered "The Sun Is Shining", the enigmatic "I Don't Ache" and other early favorites.

"Paprika and Uranium Buzz," from 1998, contains 10 arty folk songs recorded in a barn in upstate New York, plus one live instrumental from a show in New York City ... quirky, subtle and finger-picked.

From 2002, "Ivan's Dream Band" captures Ivan and the band at their best in a range of styles. Lyrical, melodic, poetic and still rocking ... Includes such favorites as "I'm In NY", "Roll On" and "Onion Skin".

Ivan and the Dream Band are planning TWO releases in 2008! "Searching Bird (Collection 2002-2007)" is a 4 disc compilation (over 50 songs!) recorded over a five year period, co-produced by Rod Sherwood. While these tunes have been performed live and released in various formats, given the vast quantity of material, Ivan has decided to put them all together in one giant beautiful package, featuring cover art by Michael Ajerman (check out "pics") ... The songs range from heavily orchestrated rock songs with strings to intimate finger-picked folk tunes. Needless to say, Ivan is very excited to be releasing these songs to the world at last.

"My Precious Bird" is a 12-song collection featuring his most recent material, co-produced by Adam Small and featuring the lovely vocals of Cat Martino along with the stellar Dream Band ... the CDs are currently being duplicated and will be ready for proper release by July 1st - until then, check out 6 songs from this project above.