Steeped in music and always looking ahead.
Kara Manning is the web editor and writer for The Alternate Side's blog, and an on-air interviewer for WFUV and The Alternate Side. While at WFUV, she's chatted with Charlotte Gainsbourg, Jónsi, Elbow, The Horrors, Laura Marling, Michael Kiwanuka and many others. Her favorite bands/artists include Underworld, the Cure, Metronomy, New Order, Field Music, Tinariwen, Pulp, Everything Everything, Gruff Rhys, Radiohead and Phoenix. Given WFUV's equally eclectic nature, she is thrilled to be part of the WFUV/TAS team.
For nearly a decade she was the producer of Vin Scelsa's "Idiot's Delight" on WNEW-FM and WXRK where she learned about smart interviews and the art of the meaningful segue. She also worked as a reporter for MTV News, covering hard news stories, braving the dark days of boy bands, and interviewing celebrities like George Clooney, Christina Aguilera and Dave Matthews. During her nine-year tenure at MTV, Kara was also senior producer and writer of the TRL Weekend Countdown with Damien Fahey.
During the years of early Brit-pop and flannel-wrapped grunge, she was a staff writer for Rolling Stone magazine, penning features on bands like Elastica and Weezer and originating the Raves column where she quizzed the likes of Bjork and Noel Gallagher. She's reviewed more albums than she can recall. Kara also co-wrote liner notes to the Grammy-nominated Rhino box set "Respect: A Century of Women in Music."
Kara is a graduate of Columbia University's M.F.A. program in playwriting and recipient of the 2007 Princess Grace Award. Her plays have been performed or developed via the Royal Court Theater, Out of Joint, Hampstead Theater, the O'Neill Playwrights Conference, Playwrights Horizons, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, etc. Kara is a member of the 2008-2010 Women's Project Playwrights Lab and MCC Theater's Playwrights Coalition. She is also literary manager of New York's Irish Repertory Theatre.
Kara resides in Manhattan, though she has aspirations for a pretty garden flat in overpriced North London.
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