"Hershey Felder: The Piano & Me" Replaces "Hershey Felder, BEETHOVEN"

South Coast Repertory (Artistic Director David Ivers and Managing Director Suzanne Appel) and HFP LIVE have announced that, with an opportunity to present a world premiere tour immediately prior to its New York Off-Broadway opening this summer, the world premiere of Hershey Felder: The Piano & Me will replace Hershey Felder, BEETHOVEN on SCR’s spring schedule. The renowned pianist/actor/playwright/producer’s newest production will run June 9-21 on the Segerstrom Stage.

Known for his hit portrayals of musical geniuses in his beloved composer series, Felder now renders a different musical artist: himself. In this deeply moving new play, Felder pulls back the curtain on his own story. Growing up in Montreal as the child of Polish and Hungarian immigrants, a young Felder discovers the piano, its captivating music connecting him to his unsuspected heritage, while opening up a remarkable new world full of adventure, possibility, heartbreak, and connection. Featuring performances of beloved compositions by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninoff, Bartók and more, Hershey Felder: The Piano & Me recounts the inspiration behind Felder’s illustrious career of more than 6,000 performances across the globe and offers a poignant and profoundly touching portrait of the power of music.

David John Chavez, the former chair of the American Theatre Critics Association and a two-time jurist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, wrote in the San Jose Mercury News that “The musicianship Felder displays through the two hours of uninterrupted storytelling is magnificent.”

San Francisco Theater Blog gave Hershey Felder: The Piano & Me five stars out of five (★★★★★, Out of 5) and wrote, “We urge you to see this show, to understand the possibilities of live performance and music together, and how they can reach into your heart and tug at it until it hurts.”

The Piano & Me features the music of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Bartok, Rachmaninoff, Gershwin, Williams and Felder with a book by Hershey Felder. Dramaturgy by Jerry Patch, South Coast Repertory’s Resident Dramaturg. Concept design is by Hershey Felder. Lighting is by Christopher Rynne, sound and production management is by Erik Carstensen. Projections are by Stefano Decarli. Produced by HFP and Tammy Globerman.

“Without a doubt, Hershey Felder’s The Piano & Me has quickly become my favorite work in his canon,” Ivers said. “Having just seen the beginnings of its world premiere in Palo Alto, I can tell you unequivocally it’s the right programmatic change for you and SCR. I know you’ll be moved by his personal, hilarious and inspiring journey.”

Since the 1998 premiere of his internationally lauded play with music George Gershwin Alone, Felder has appeared on world renowned stages throughout the United States and abroad giving more than six thousand performances on stages in original works that include “George Gershwin Alone, Beethoven, Maestro Bernstein, Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin, as well at the appearances of Our Great Tchaikovsky, A Paris Love Story-Debussy, and more. Film world premieres at the Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills include several of his award-winning films: Musical Tales in the Venetian Jewish Ghetto, The Assembly, Noble Genius Chopin & Liszt, and more. In all, Felder has performed on more than 100 stages in leading worldwide theatres. He is currently that Artistic Director of Florence Italy’s most historic theatre, Teatro Niccolni (1648) where he presents great and celebrated American and International from Jeff Goldblum to Helen Mirren, Malcolm McDowell, Mikhail Baryshnikov and many more.

“We are thrilled to be able to share with audiences Hershey’s very personal story about the role music has played in his life, as he has made music come alive for so many of us,” Appel said. “Hershey Felder’s The Piano and Me will build upon South Coast Repertory’s spring season of world premieres on our stages. Audiences in Orange County are in the rare position to be among the first in the world to see this future classic.”

Tickets already purchased for Hershey Felder, BEETHOVEN will be automatically honored for The Piano & Me.  Other options are also available to ticket holders and they can learn about them by contacting the SCR Ticket Services Office at (714) 708-5555.  The June 14 performance of Hershey Felder’s Great American Songbook Sing-Along remains as scheduled.  Tickets and more information are available at scr.org.

Hershey Felder (Actor, Pianist, Producer, Playwright, Composer) is currently the Artistic Director of FirenzeOnStage, directing Teatro Niccolini in Florence, Italy, (Florence’s oldest theatre, 1648) at the left wing of Florence’s historic Duomo. Felder opened the 2024-25 season with film and stage superstar Jeff Goldblum, and presented international superstars such as Helen Mirren, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Boris Giltburg, Taylor Hackford, Tony winners Santino Fontana, Jenn Colella, the cast of the film of Sound of Music and many more.

For the 2025-26 season, Felder presented the Italian premiere of Caligula the Final Cut, with the presence of its superstars, Malcolm McDowell and Helen Mirren in a discussion with the audience. The season continues with stars of stage, screen, opera and classical music,

American Theatre Magazine has said, “Hershey Felder, actor, Steinway Concert Artist and theatrical creator is in a category all his own.” Following 28 years of continuous stage productions and over 6,000 live performances throughout the U.S. and abroad, Hershey Felder created Live from Florence, An Arts Broadcasting Company, based in Florence, Italy, which has produced eighteen theatrical films to date. They include the recently-released Noble Genius-Chopin & Liszt; The Assembly; Violetta, the story of Verdi’s Traviata; Dante and Beatrice; Mozart and Figaro in Vienna; the world premiere musicals Nicholas, Anna & Sergei; the story of Sergei Rachmaninoff; Puccini, the story of famed opera composer Giacomo Puccini; Before Fiddler, a musical story about writer Sholem Aleichem; Great American Songs and the Stories Behind Them, Leonard Bernstein and the Israel Philharmonic, a documentary, and the popular Musical Tales in the Venetian Jewish Ghetto. Two seasons of programming are currently available at www.hersheyfelder.net with season 3 being launched in spring of 2026. Upcoming films include The 60^th anniversary documentary story of The Sound of Music film; The Joe Alterman Project featuring the story of jazz pianist Joe Alterman, and Tender Art, the story of George Sand, Eugène Delacroix and Fryderyk Chopin.

Felder has given performances of his solo theatre productions at some of the world’s most prestigious theatres and has consistently broken box office records. His shows include George Gershwin Alone (Broadway’s Helen Hayes Theatre, West End’s Duchess Theatre); Monsieur Chopin; Beethoven; Maestro (Leonard Bernstein); Franz Liszt in Musik, Lincoln: An American Story, Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin, Our Great Tchaikovsky, and A Paris Love Story (Debussy), Monsieur Chopin and Rachmaninoff and the Tsar. Season 2024 saw the world premiere of Rachmaninoff and the Tsar, as composer-pianist Sergei Rachmaninoff opposite Jonathan Silvestri as Tsar Nicholas II. His compositions and recordings include Aliyah, Concerto for Piano and Orchestra; Fairytale, a musical; Les Anges de Paris, Suite for Violin and Piano; Song Settings; Saltimbanques for Piano and Orchestra; Etudes Thematiques for Piano; An American Story for Actor and Orchestra, and the opera Il Quarto Uomo that premiered in Fiesole, Italy in the summer of 2023 with the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino. Felder is the adaptor, director, and designer for the internationally performed play-with-music The Pianist of Willesden Lane with Steinway artist Mona Golabek; producer and designer for the musical Louis and Keely: ‘Live’ at the Sahara, directed by Taylor Hackford; and writer and director for Flying Solo, featuring opera legend Nathan Gunn. Felder has operated a full-service production company since 2001. He has been a scholar-in-residence at Harvard University’s Department of Music and is married to Rt. Hn. Kim Campbell. Hershey currently resides in Florence where he is the director of a full-service film production studio, Monte Acuto Arti, in Bagno a Ripoli.