Derek Katz

Derek Katz is an Associate Professor of Musicology at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), serving as Undergraduate Advisor. He holds a PhD from UCSB and a BA from Harvard University, with additional studies at the Free University of Berlin via a Fulbright Fellowship. His expertise focuses on Czech music, opera nationalism, and modernism.

Research interests include Janáček's operas, institutional support for 20th-century string quartets (e.g., the Kolisch Quartet), and public musicology initiatives. He collaborates with institutions like the San Francisco Opera Guild and the Ives Collective.

Publications span Musical Quarterly , Czech journals, and edited volumes on Janáček and modernist opera. His book Janáček Beyond the Borders (2009) explores transnational influences on Czech music. Recent work examines mid-20th-century American musical patronage through the New Friends of Music in New York.

Awarded the Fulbright Fellowship, he has contributed program essays to leading venues (Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall) and written for The New York Times on operatic themes. He actively engages in performance through chamber music and viola playing.