Joe's Pub Concert 02/22

In My Own Words...

Lights up on a Palestinian immigrant kid raised in New York City.

My "origin story" really starts at eight years old when my neighbor (a prototypical American teen boy) lent me his iPod Nano. While my parents crooned along to the poetic ballads of Fairuz, I found myself screaming out the angsty anthems of Linkin Park, Green Day, and Fall Out Boy.

Ever since then, I’ve been on a mission to revive emo, pop-punk, and alt-rock music, not just with catchy hooks, but through storytelling that’s both heartfelt and seductively counter-cultural.

My comedy (which I've been repeatedly told is "irreverent–" I'll look up the definition at some point) harkens back to the golden age of online web series and is also probably a direct result of staying up past my bedtime to watch Adult Swim (please don't tell my parents).

Now mix all of that with a lifelong (borderline masochistic) obsession with politics, and you've got my particular brand of musical subversive dark comedy.

“Using a blend of dark comedy and pop-punk music, Dakwar deconstructs his lived experiences as a Palestinian in the 21st century.”

Fouad Dakwar is a multimedia artist whose subversive comedy channels his Palestinian-American immigrant upbringing– all with a punk-rock twist.

His semi-autobiographical musical, Fouad of Nazareth, has been featured on the Playbill Songwriter Series, which aptly described him as “a darkly comic pop-punk composer on the rise.”

The piece was first developed in Berklee NYC’s Writing and Production for Musical Theater Master’s program, premiered to two sold-out concert fundraisers for the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund at Joe's Pub, was a semi-finalist for the 2025 Relentless Musical Award, and received a residency in the 2025 Johnny Mercer Foundation Writers Grove at Goodspeed.

Fouad of Nazareth's upcoming concept album was produced by Noor Theatre and recorded at the Power Station at Berklee NYC with support from Pop Culture Collaborative’s “Becoming America” grant. The album will launch with a one-night only concert performance at Ars Nova.

Fouad is also a...

2024-25 Dramatists Guild Foundation Fellow
2025 Yes And... Laughter Lab Fellow
2026 Kleban Prize librettist finalist
2023 Jonathan Larson Grant finalist
Member of the Joe's Pub Council

Born in Nazareth, the laughter Fouad evokes is Biblical.

In Case You Prefer Third Person...

Photograph courtesy of Dash Kolos

"Fouad grew up attending protests with his parents... and began writing musicals in high school and found in the medium a popular form in which he could connect people to social justice issues."

"The performance of Dakwar, who participated in the show and composed the lyrics and music, helped inspire and encourage the performances of the other actors and musicians in the hall, whose audience was diverse in age and background, reflecting the diversity of New York City."

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