THE SOUND OF US
Stories, Music & Conversation with Peabody Award-Winner
Catherine Burns & Special Guest
Through a true, personal story, an acclaimed musical artist offers a rare glimpse into their inspiration and celebrated career. Then, following a masterful performance, the evening continues with a revelatory conversation hosted by Catherine Burns.
NEXT UP:
July 18th: Christian McBride with Catherine Burns at Tanglewood.
CUSTOMIZED EVENTS FOR PERFORMING ARTS CENTERS, CLUBS, SALONS, AND PRIVATE GATHERINGS
“Utterly absorbing and unexpectedly moving!”
- New York Times on Helen & Edgar
Catherine Burns is a Peabody Award–winning director and storytelling coach. From 2003 to 2023, she was the artistic director of The Moth, the juggernaut of true stories told live, starting out as one of just two employees, and helping grow the company into a beloved international brand with shows on six continents. She was a host and producer of The Moth Radio Hour, heard on nearly 600 public radio stations and the BBC, and is co-author of the New York Times bestseller How to Tell a Story. As one of the lead directors on The Moth’s Mainstage, she has helped thousands of people craft their stories including Pulitzer Prize-winning authors, Nobel laureates, the Tower of London’s Ravenmaster, a New York City sanitation worker, and luminaries such as David Byrne, Elizabeth Gilbert, Malcolm Gladwell, Padma Lakshmi, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Salman Rushdie. She is the editor of the best-selling and critically-acclaimed books The Moth: 50 True Stories, All These Wonders, Occasional Magic, and A Point of Beauty.
She is the director of the off-Broadway shows Loud Memory (written and performed by Ed Gavagan), The Gates (written and performed by Adam Gopnik), and Helen & Edgar (written and performed by Edgar Oliver). Her new podcast, The Thin Places, is coming later this year. You can find her on Substack:
https://substack.com/@thethinplaces.
In 2025, Catherine Burns and Producer Anna Becker conceived “The Sound of Us: Stories, Music & Conversation,” featuring acclaimed guest musicians in customized events for performing arts centers, clubs, salons, and private gatherings.
TESTIMONIALS
“Everyone has a story to tell, and everyone needs a Catherine Burns to coax it out of them.”
- Padma Lakshmi, author and TV host (Top Chef, America’s Culinary Cup, Taste the Nation)
“A wonderful new book. Some [stories] are heartbreakingly sad; some laugh-out-loud funny; some momentous and tragic; almost all of them resonant or surprising. They are stories that attest to the startling varieties and travails of human experience, and the shared threads of love, loss, fear and kindness that connect us."
- Michiko Kakutani, lead New York Times book critic on All These Wonders
“Working with Catherine on my first Moth story would fundamentally change the way I perform for the rest of my career.”
- Mike Birbiglia, stand up comedian, actor, writer, and director