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WHAT'S NEW 2024-25

ANNOUNCING:

The complete performing script of MUSE of FIRE will published next year by DelGatto Press. The edition will feature copious annotations, critiques and appreciations from professionals, and will feature an extensive consideration of the play written by the great American pianist, conductor and pedagogue, Lorin Hollander. Details soon.


2025 ANNIVESARY:

2025 marks the 30th anniversary of the death of Charles Bruck at the Monteux School in Hancock, Maine and the 20th anniversary of the premiere of MUSE of FIRE. During the year, Maestro Katz is pleased to offer dramatic readings of the play in conjunction with its publication, scheduled for spring 2025. Please contact him now to arrange a visit for your audience. Dates available through fall 2025.

 

PERFORMANCE HISTORY:

PRIVATE PERFORMANCE: MUSE of FIRE at the Conductors Retreat at Medomak, Washington, ME. Performance at the request of Maestro Kenneth Kiesler. (This is David's third appearance in MUSE of FIRE at the unique conducting school near Camden.)

COMMAND PERFORMANCE: MUSE of FIRE for the University of Michigan School of Music, Britton Recital Hall.

MUSE of FIRE returns to MICHIGAN, performance sponsored by HILLSDALE COLLEGE, Hillsdale, MI.

OHIO DEBUT of MUSE of FIRE, performance sponsored by Malone University, Canton, Ohio.

WISCONSIN DEBUT of MUSE of FIRE, performance sponsored by the Oconomowoc Chamber Orchestra, Oconomowoc, WI.

MUSE of FIRE returns to KENTUCKY: performance sponsored by the Centre College Music Department, Danville, KY.

MUSE of FIRE returns to MICHIGAN: performance sponsored by Adrian College in cooperation with the Adrian Symphony Orchestra, Adrian, MI.

NEW JERSEY DEBUT of MUSE of FIRE, performance sponsored by the Garden State Philharmonic

MORE RECENT PERFORMANCES


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"...This is a powerful, powerful experience, and so well acted, so well written, so well directed..."—WFMT Fine Arts Radio (Chicago)

 

 

CHARLES NELSON REILLY

Charles Nelson Reilly (director of the first production of MUSE of FIRE) was a Tony Award-winning actor and Broadway stage director, and an acclaimed opera director and acting teacher. Far more than the zany television personality by which he was most often identified, Reilly nurtured the creation of a whole series of unique one-person stage plays. Most famously, he directed Julie Harris in her Tony Award—winning star turn in The Belle of Amherst, based on the life and poetry of Emily Dickinson.

Among his many Broadway directing credits were Ira Levin’s Break a Leg, Larry Shue’s The Nerd, and the revival of The Gin Game, starring Miss Harris and Charles Durning, for which Mr. Reilly was the sole American director to be nominated for a Tony in 1997. Mr. Reilly’s career as an opera director included productions for Chicago Opera Theater, Dallas Opera, San Diego Opera, Palm Beach Opera, Toledo Opera, Milwaukee Opera and Opera Pacific.

David Katz and Charles Nelson Reilly were friends for three decades, first meeting through their mutual Hartford voice teacher, Mrs. Friedrich Schorr. Charles Nelson Reilly died in May 2007. MUSE of FIRE was his last play.