Deborah's Biography

Deborah Dunleavy is an award winning Literary Artist with over 30 years of professional experience in creating, producing and performing her programs both nationally and internationally.

 

The Scottish International Storytelling Festival, Edinburgh, featured Deborah in October 2019 with her performance of her original Storytelling Oratorio "Isobel Gunn"; music composed by Howard Alexander.

 

Her playwriting and performing works also include "Battlefield Petticoats - Women in the War of 1812", and "At The Canoe Club Dance" - a storytelling musical based on true accounts collected from seniors who remembered the years before 1945. As well Deborah is a prolific song crafter with five award winning children's recordings to her credit.

 

"The Truth About Trees" is Deborah's first foray into adult fiction. Currently Deborah is writing "Unsayable Absence" a Canadian historical fiction set between the years of 1900 and 1932. In all Deborah has had four books published.

 

Deborah happily acknowledges that she frequently collaborates with her husband, composer Howard Alexander. She co-wrote and performed in "La Befana's Gifts" - a Storytelling Oratorio for Young Audiences. Deborah is the librettist for their Chamber Opera, "The Last Wife" which she produced in recital with a cast and orchestra of professional and community artists.

 

This year Deborah partnered with Howard to write "Scantily Clad - A Musical Melodrama" which is slated to be produced in the near future.

 

Highly regarded by her peers Deborah is a recipient of numerous awards from The Canada Council for the Arts, The Ontario Arts Council, and Storytelling Toronto.