Christopher
Norton in Southern California 9th – 16th March 2013
I’ve been to MTNA (the Music Teachers National Association)
every year since 2007, not to mention the MTNA in Portland in 1987! This year,
MTNA, the biggest music teacher convention in the US, took place in Anaheim,
CA. Ok, it was held at the Disneyland Hotel! Here’s where I was staying:
and for those of you with an interest in such things, here’s
what was on the bed of my hotel room:
So there you have it….
At MTNA, I was manning a booth that represented both
American Popular Piano and Boosey & Hawkes books and I played lots of music
from both series, as well as from Connections. I had a nice piano and was able
to provide hands-on experience to teachers (including APP improvisation Etudes)
Scott McBride Smith and I also did a presentation on APP,
which was remarkably well-attended (125 people) considering it was at 8 am!
Sales were strong across all products and there was lots of interest in Piano
Festivals and other events. I was also very pleased to meet up with Jovanni-Rey
De Pedro, who has commissioned my new Jazz Piano Sonata, and we went through it
on one of the many grand pianos available.
Australian composer (but New Zealand-born, that’s the
important thing!) Elissa Milne and her mother also stopped by and were
serenaded (at their request) with Christmas carols from the new(ish) Microjazz
Christmas books.
It was a very worthwhile convention, with events hosted by
Clavier Companion, who I write occasional articles for, and by Scott McBride
Smith and Ingrid Clarfield. I also hung out with David and Olvia Riddell from
MYC, Susan Geffen from Clavier Companion, Connie Wible from Seattle, not to
mention Dennis Alexander, Peter Mack, Vanessa Curdett-Murtada…. And I was
particularly delighted that my US “agents”, Olive and Anthony Yau, were able to
come to the convention for a day and meet with me and others to plan an
exciting 2014.
After MTNA, I did a number of events in Orange County and
Santa Monica for local teachers. The first was at Nancy Woo’s Southwest
Conservatory of Music, where I gave a well-received presentation to a group of
local teachers on using pop styles. Here are 2 of the teachers after the
presentation, looking forward to using the books in their studios:
Nancy Woo’s name is on the ballot for the MTAC (Music
Teachers Association of California) state board of directors, so she’s not just
a great piano teacher and ace music dealer!
I also did 2 sessions with Nancy’s students. Rhythm Mania
was the name of the session and they played and jammed on pieces in 8 different
styles. A good time was had by all.
The next day I had been invited to take a masterclass with 9
students of Sue Dibble, a private teacher based in Irvine. Sue's website is http://ezpiano.org - do check it out. The students were
well prepared and really delightful as well. Here’s one of them after the
masterclass:
Sue is from Malaysia, but married to an American, so we had
a really first-rate meal at an authentic Malaysian restaurant after the
masterclass:
My final post-MTNA event was organised by Deborah How in
Santa Monica. Deborah has been a leading light in the Carnegie Hall assessment
programme and has also started a new initiative, Bravura Innovations (www.BRAVURAinnovations.com) that
is hoping to help legitimise more popular and improvisatory strands in formal
piano examinations.
This event consisted of a master class for 2 hours, followed
by “Rhythm Mania” for 2 hours. The masterclass had students from 2 studios and
they were well prepared and played very musically. The parents (and teachers I
suspect) were pleasantly surprised to hear how much emphasis I placed on
correct hand position and graceful phrasing. I got most of the students to try
to play with a track, which they hadn’t done before. Most of them did very well
in a more strict-time environment.
Rhythm Mania was a session exploring playing by ear, playing
chords in inversion through a chord progression (with a backing track) playing
a bass line through a chord progression, creating an idea that is repeated and
“drumming” along to a teacher part or track. We used 8 pieces, from APP,
Connections, Microjazz, Microstyles, MicroRock and MicroBallads. I had 20
students on digital pianos as well as some teachers and parents on pianos
around the outside. A very stimulating session!
There is definitely great interest in Southern California in
a Christopher Norton Piano Festival and other related events. My material is
listed on the Royal Conservatory Assessment Programme, ABRSM and the
Californian Certificate of Merit, so name recognition is becoming less of an
issue for teachers. The next step is to persuade more Californian teachers that
exploring popular styles and improvisation in this way is not daunting or even entirely
unfamiliar. See you in 2014! Do check out http://www.oliveland.com/nortonevent
Christopher Norton
Los Angeles, CA 17th March 2013
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