Lawrence Arabia Announces New Solo Piano Tour Dates

Considering the 'Malade' (sorry) state of the world, the wonderful Lawrence Arabia is softening the blow a little by announcing postponement dates for his cancelled March shows, and has added a bonus third date for Tāmaki Makaurau. The "pre-eminent chronicler of 21st Century bourgeois dilemmas" James Milne will unfortunately no longer be joined by The Veils frontman Finn Andrews in Hastings. Thankfully, "with a sense of (naive?) optimism" the run of solo shows must go on – a cautious and very sensible seven months later. Scroll downwards for the artists' full statement, including info for ticket holders...

UnderTheRadar proudly presents...

Lawrence Arabia - Single. Solo Piano Tour

Treat your eyes and ears to the breathtaking Francis Haszard animated visuals for 'One Unique Creature'...

Press release:

Kia ora friends of Lawrence Arabia and Banished Music

As some of you (but not all of you) will have seen on social media, we have postponed the upcoming Lawrence Arabia tour dates, due to the ongoing and evolving Covid-19 situation. We have rescheduled the dates, in the hope that you will hold onto your tickets, rather than asking for a refund. As you may have seen from lots of industry providers, this is how you can help and support Lawrence Arabia, and Banished Music through a very difficult time that we are facing together. That said, we understand that you also could be facing a tough time, given the financial implications of Covid-19, so if you do need a refund, please contact us and we can arrange it.

Your current tickets are valid for the below rescheduled dates:

Tuesday 17th March (Auckland), rescheduled date is Tuesday 13th October
Wednesday 18th March (Auckland), rescheduled date is Wednesday 14th October + an extra show added on Monday 12th October
Friday 20th March (Hamilton), rescheduled date is Friday 16th October
Saturday 21st March (Coromandel), rescheduled date is Saturday 17th October
Sunday 22nd March (Tauranga), rescheduled date is Sunday 18th October
Friday 3rd April (Hastings), rescheduled date is Friday 6th November
Saturday 4th April (New Plymouth), rescheduled date is Saturday 7th November

Nothing is required from you, simply hold onto your tickets and turn up to the new show, in your town. If you are unable to make the new dates, but are in a position to donate them to friends, please do so, if that is not an option, but you are in a financial position to forgo your refund, which effectively passes on the cost of the tickets to the artist, we encourage you to visit ForgoMyRefund.org.

This tool allows ticket buyers to forgo their refund to support artists and event organisers who have had to cancel their events. Though the public are concerned about how this outbreak will affect them personally, there is also already a huge sense of how the public can support local organisations and businesses which are core to our communities. For Hastings ticket holders, please note Finn Andrews will no longer be performing due to conflicting schedules between Lawrence and Finn. We promise you are still in for an excellent show, and hope that you can support us by still attending. If required, we can arrange a partial refund, please contact us directly via the 'contact your organiser' button on your ticket.

Please see Lawrence Arabia's statement below about the tour postponement.Many thanks and hope you are all keeping well, safe and OK, in this crazy time! Team Banished

"Well this is all pretty weird!... I've spent the last 72 or so hours moving from complacency to abject panic, briefly back to scepticism and finally to a temperate rational fear about this dramatically escalating pandemic, all the while considering the implications for my upcoming wee tour. Viewing endless cancellation and postponement announcements on my Instagram feed has obviously raised the spectre of a postponement of my own tour and I have of course been considering this very seriously.

Until this morning, I had been of the mind to go ahead with the shows. Not because I'm underestimating the gravity of this situation – I'm highly cognisant of the necessity to "flatten the curve," and it seems that social distancing measures as soon as possible in the event of community spread will be utterly essential to ensure that health services aren't overloaded and people don't die unnecessarily. As of today though, there are eight cases in New Zealand, all of whom have arrived from overseas. This likely will change of course over the coming weeks, but, today at least, your chances of catching the disease from a fellow resident at a Lawrence Arabia show are similar to winning the Powerball. Schools are still in, most of the Auckland Arts Festival shows are still on – hence, all guns blazing, right?

However, upon further reflection, I also considered that I had been to Australia over the weekend, arrived home on Sunday, and, had I landed home 8 hours later, would have had to have self-isolated for 14 days under the new imposed travel regulations. If the one person at the Lawrence Arabia concert with COVID-19 turned out to be me, recently returned from Australia, hours before the cutoff, that would have been highly embarrassing to say the least.

So, upon discussions with my promoter Banished Music, and the venues that I am playing at, we have reluctantly decided to err on the side of caution and postpone these gigs for now.

I'm really sad about this, but also looking forward to coming back (in the spring) and doing these shows.

In addition, I must add to the chorus of people imploring support for my compadres in the music industry. These kind of postponements (or cancellations), as they inevitably are increasingly necessitated, will have significant effects on the livelihoods of musicians, venues, roadies, sound engineers, promoters etc. Consciously purchasing music that you are loving on streaming services via artists' Bandcamp pages is a great way of sending largely unmediated money to musicians.

If it's within your means, not claiming refunds for cancelled or postponed shows will ensure your favourite promoters live to continue bringing your favourite acts to your town when this all subsides. I hope that other support measures will be announced for hospitality businesses and freelance contractors like roadies and sound technicians who are going to take a huge hit from this."