Bruce Montgomery (entertainer)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bruce Montgomery (born 1933) is an American composer, author, musical theater performer, painter, conductor, and director, particularly of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas.

'Monty', as Bruce Eglinton Montgomery is known around the Philadelphia performing community, is perhaps best known for his long tenure as director of musical activities at the University of Pennsylvania. He served as director of the Penn Glee Club for 44 years, and published a book in 2005 (Brothers, Sing On) relating many of his favorite stories from his tenure as director of the Glee Club. He also helped to create the Penn Singers as a light opera company in 1971, and continues to serve as their director. In addition, he also served as director and/or music director of Mask and Wig, the University Band, Penn Players, and many other musical and theatrical groups at Penn before his retirement in 2000. His only remaining official position at Penn as of 2005 was directing the Penn Singers' spring shows.

Montgomery was the Artistic Director for the Gilbert & Sullivan Players of Philadelphia until 2005 and Stage Director for the Gilbert & Sullivan Society of Chester County in West Chester, Pennsylvania until 2005.

Montgomery is also a composer and lyricist whose works have been performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, and many other performing groups. He has both directed and starred in each of the 14 Gilbert and Sullivan operettas. The music he wrote for Gilbert and Sullivan's Thespis in the 1950s, for which Sullivan's original music is mostly lost, was produced successfully by him on several occasions.

Montgomery also wrote John Barleycorn, a ballad opera in 3 acts, with Mary Fairclough. After his 1963 "Irish folk opera" Spindrift, was performed by the Penn Singers and the Penn Players, he wrote his 1964 off-Broadway show, The Amorous Flea, based on Molière's School for Wives is still performed occasionally. In 1972, he wrote An Orpheus Triptych for the Orpheus Club of Philadelphia, a choral setting based on poems to Orpheus. Mongomery's paintings and sculptures adorn many private collections and galleries.