'A show of unflinching honesty and a tribute to the power of music.'
- The Scotsman
When soprano Katy Lees was given months to live, she defiantly replied: ‘Fine. I’ll have 600.’
But Katy had to decide: even if she lived, would she ever sing again?
Originally performed in sell-out shows at south London’s Lantern Arts Centre, and one of Rolling Stone's pick of the Edinburgh Fringe 2026, Breathe is a captivating one-woman theatre show created and performed by Katy Lees and co-written/directed by Amy Phillips.
Twenty years on from her terminal cancer diagnosis and miraculous recovery, Katy tells her compelling story and sings the arias that sustained her. By turns humorous and heartfelt, the show traces how singing became a way for Katy to give shape to overwhelming emotion — fear, rage, tenderness and joy — when language alone was not enough. A way back to life.
If you’ve always thought of opera as purely an elite art form, think again. Breathe reframes opera as something immediate, shared and deeply human. Katy challenges our preconceptions of ‘beautiful voices’ as something exclusive and out of reach. Instead, she playfully encourages us to see the power of singing to connect us to ourselves, as well as each other.
The arias, sung by Katy herself, form the spine of the performance, which weaves opera with spoken storytelling and intimate recorded voiceovers from family members, punctuating her story with heartbreaking reality and tenderness.
Breathe Team
KATY LEES — PERFORMER/CO-WRITER
Katy Lees is a singer, singing teacher and choir director. As a singer she toured extensively in Europe, North America and the UK.
After cancer diagnosis and treatment interrupted her career in 2006, she realised that her true vocation lay in helping others to discover their own potential and love for music and singing.
In true reciprocity, seeing others enjoy their singing encouraged Katy to explore singing and performing again. She started studying with Charlotte Xerri at Voice Your Potential and with Amy Phillips at First Act.
Breathe is a culmination of what she has learned over the last 20 years and is dedicated to anyone trying to make lemonade out of lemons.
AMY PHILLIPS — DIRECTOR/CO-WRITER
Amy Phillips is a director, writer and theatre practitioner and the Artistic Director of the Lantern Arts Centre in south west London, where Breathe was developed.
Amy's LAC directing credits include: Hey Kid. Hey Goat (also Riverside Studios), Sister Act, Blue Stockings, Hay Fever, Our Town, Harvey and pantomimes Jack & the Beanstalk and Rapunzel, which she also wrote. Most recently Amy directed Amanda Whittington's Be My Baby two decades after playing Mary Adams in the original Soho Theatre tour. Amy has run the LAC's acting course for adults, 'First Act', since 2011 - all her directing and coaching work is firmly rooted in making actors and non-actors feel as confident as possible.
After making her television debut in the BBC children’s drama Grange Hill, Amy worked for over 25 years as an actress. During her years as an actress, Amy was lucky enough to work with some incredible talent across film, television and theatre. Her teenage girls are most impressed that she made two feature films in London and New York in the summer of '97 with Parker Posey - Amy concedes this makes her sound way cooler than she actually is.
Amy will direct JB Priestley's When We Are Married at the Lantern Arts Centre in the Spring of 2027. www.lanternarts.org
