About Us
The mission of the Peter Foley Music Project is to further the artistic legacy of composer/lyricist Peter Foley (1967-2021) through promoting and supporting performance, recording, and publication of his works.
Our Story
On July 31, 2021, shortly after Peter had begun home hospice following a 10-year battle with a rare cancer, ocular melanoma, his friends and colleagues hosted a virtual listening party of demo and live recordings of Peter’s songs. In presenting such a wide variety of selections back-to-back, spanning 1988 to 2021, the full richness, complexity, and beauty of Peter’s life’s work was abundantly clear, and a group of dedicated fans, colleagues, and supporters began talking about ways to get more of Peter’s work out into the world.
The Peter Foley Music Project was born out of those discussions and incorporated as a not-for-profit charitable organization on November 22, 2021.
To learn about how we are furthering Peter’s artistic legacy, please read about our Projects, as well as ways you can help. Download a brochure here.
Peter died on August 27, 2021, at age 54, but his music lives on.
Our Priorities
In his short lifetime, Peter created a remarkable body of work, including five full-length musicals and an operetta—each vastly different from the others in subject matter, tone, and musical style—as well as art and cabaret songs, choral pieces, and dozens of instrumental scores for plays and television.
Only one of the musicals, The Hidden Sky, has had a premiere professional production, and only two songs have been commercially recorded. None of his stage works have been published or professionally recorded beyond demos. Priorities for the foundation are to:
Publicize Peter’s work and legacy to make his music more widely known, performed, and appreciated.
Create performance-ready materials and publish Peter’s songs.
Arrange and support professional performances and recordings of Peter’s work.
Promote and fund production and development of Peter’s stage works.
Our Board
Kate Chisholm, President & Executive Director
Kate is a director, educator, and award-winning writer. Collaborations with Peter Foley include writing the book for The Hidden Sky (Richard Rodgers Award; nominated for six Barrymore Awards, including Outstanding New Play) and directing the New York premiere at Prospect Theater Company; writing, designing, and directing Newton’s Universe for the St. Ann's Warehouse Puppet Lab (music by Peter); directing the world premiere of Heartfield by Kenneth Allan Vega at Baltimore Theatre Project (music direction and vocal arrangements by Peter); singing on dozens of demos; and starring in Whitechapel at Yale University (music and lyrics by Peter). Married for 27 years, Peter and Kate also created a beautiful human being named Grace.
In addition to leading the Peter Foley Music Project, Kate is Managing Editor of SDC Journal and previously worked as Manager of Promotion and Special Projects at the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music. She has taught theater at Pratt Institute, in the New York City Public Schools, and in youth programs.
Kate holds a BA in English from Yale University and an MFA in Theatre from Towson University. She is an alum of the Lincoln Center Theater Director’s Lab and St. Ann’s Warehouse Puppet Lab and participated in the Lincoln Center Scholars program. She is a trustee of the Lois Lenski Covey Foundation and is honored to be carrying Peter’s legacy forward through the Peter Foley Music Project.
Aaron Davidman, Secretary
Aaron held the distinguished position of Peter Foley’s Wingman for more than four decades, the two growing up alongside each other in Berkeley, California.
Aaron is a writer, actor, director and producer. He is drawn to stories of ethnic history and cultural complexity that challenge our assumptions of the “other.” He has written, directed and performed at theatres around the country. His play, Wrestling Jerusalem, a solo performance about Israel/Palestine, toured internationally from 2014-2019. In 2016, the play was made into a feature film (now streaming on Amazon Prime). He designed post-screening programs for community dialogue and works with the Google School for Leaders, using his film as a catalyst for understanding Complexity and Multiple-Perspectives.
Aaron was the artistic director of Traveling Jewish Theatre in San Francisco from 2001-2011, where he produced, directed, wrote and performed in dozens of works exploring contemporary Jewish life. He received his theatrical training at Carnegie Mellon University, earned a BA from the University of Michigan and an MFA in creative writing/playwriting from San Francisco State University. He was a recipient of the TIKKUN Award in 2016 for Wrestling Jerusalem’s evocation of “radical empathy.” More at aarondavidman.com.
Kevin Mayes, Treasurer
Kevin had the great fortune to meet Peter while singing in the a cappella singing group The Yale Alley Cats, which launched their 36 years of friendship and artistic collaboration. He started his career as an assistant to acclaimed Broadway director Lloyd Richards at the O’Neill Playwrights Conference. While in NYC, he worked as an actor at various theater companies. Portraying Hyppolytus in kabuki makeup, diaper and a wheelchair at The Living Theater in the East Village was an unfortunate highlight. Another more fortunate was coordinating music for the original production of Wendy Wasserstein’s The Sisters Rosensweig at Lincoln Center.
He later moved to Chicago and launched a career in technology, focusing heavily on software design and product management for every size company from startups to Fortune 50 corporations. Through it all, he has continued to act and produce theater. Favorite acting projects include the musical The Adding Machine at Next Theater, Gross Indecency at BoHo, and My Favorite Year and A Man of No Importance at Bailiwick Repertory. He has been Jeff-nominated twice for Best Actor in a Musical. He led the development of an original musical titled Bloom about “tulipmania”, for which Peter wrote the score, while Artistic Director at Bailiwick Chicago. He wrote the music for a theatrical version of Frankenstien in Austin, TX, for which he was nominated for Best Original Score. Favorite producing projects include Bailiwick Chicago’s all-African American version of Elton John and Tim Rice’s Aida; the Chicago premiere of Joe DiPietro’s Fucking Men; the Chicago premiere of Passing Strange; and Violet at the Mercury Theater.
Music Advisory Council
Beatrice Affron
Rob Berman
Manoel Felciano
Curtis Moore
Joseph Thalken
Contact Information
Kate Chisholm, Executive Director
info@peterfoleymusic.org
208 Oak Street
Nyack, NY 10960