Lola Kirke

Lola Kirke first gained recognition for portraying leading characters in the independent feature Mistress America and the Amazon series Mozart in the Jungle, yet she simultaneously crafts country-tinged adult alternative material as a musician. Her warm, smoky vocal tone and songwriting approach marked her entrance into full-length recording with the 2018 album Heart Head West. She followed that project by issuing her second album, Lady for Sale, on Third Man Records in 2022 and the Country Curious EP in 2024.

Born in London, England, Kirke grew up in a musical household headed by her father, Simon Kirke, the former drummer for Free and Bad Company, and her eldest sister, the singer-songwriter Domino Kirke. The middle sibling, Jemima Kirke, gained widespread attention playing Jessa on the television series Girls. When Lola turned five the family moved to New York City. At sixteen she discovered Bonnie Guitar’s 1969 album Affair! at a flea market and began listening to it obsessively; she then located the country performer online, learned of her ongoing shows in Soap Lake, Washington, and spoke with her at length by telephone. While attending Bard College a few years later, she turned to the ukulele after a breakup and worked through a collection of country songs before switching to guitar and joining an all-female country group—an experience she has described as both empowering and eye-opening. Her acting career began with short films in 2010 and continued with her first feature appearance in Another Happy Day in 2011, which also featured Ellen Barkin, Ellen Burstyn, and Demi Moore. Additional supporting film parts arrived before she was cast as oboist Hailey Rutledge in Mozart in the Jungle in 2014.

She kept auditioning for screen work throughout the show’s four seasons, securing the lead in Noah Baumbach’s Mistress America in 2015 and a supporting role opposite Tom Cruise in American Made that same year. In 2016 she issued her debut collection of original songs on Spirit House Records, a four-track EP that revealed her twangy, hazy, country-rooted style. Mozart in the Jungle concluded its run in February 2018, and that April Kirke appeared with her sister Jemima in Untogether at the Tribeca Film Festival. September brought the release of her Wyndham Boylan-Garnett-produced debut album Heart Head West on Downtown Records.

Early the next year she stayed active with live dates and a cover of Rick Danko’s “Sip the Wine.” Subsequent acting credits included the 2019 drama American Woman, 2020’s Lost Girls alongside Amy Ryan, and 2021’s Broken Diamonds with Ben Platt. After signing with Third Man Records she delivered her sophomore album Lady for Sale in 2022; produced by Austin Jenkins, the record leaned into an ’80s-tinged pop-country aesthetic. The Elle King-produced Country Curious EP followed in February 2024.