Playing from the Heart

Playing from the Heart is a play about the childhood of the world famous percussionist Evelyn Glennie. It’s a gritty yet poetic piece which tells how Evelyn became a musician despite becoming profoundly deaf between eight and twelve years old. The realistic narrative is linked by a series of imaginative set pieces, which explore the inner world of the deaf child. The play explores themes of family love, overcoming impossible barriers and the very nature of art/music. It also provides a rich mix of movement, music and text.

"Way’s script – which has a seductive, memior-style tone, no doubt because it was written with Glennie’s cooperation – chronicles the vulnerable young dreamer’s enthusiasms and setbacks…It’s ultra-inspiring stuff, but Way avoids any power-of-positive-thinking triteness by anchoring the story firmly in a sense of artistic wonder.” -The Washington Post

“If it’s Charles Way’s innovative and inspirational Playing from the Heart, you get an absorbing and evocative biographical drama about a young woman both from and of the sticks who proved them all wrong to become the premiere percussion artist of her generation.” -DC Theatre Scene