Christopher Norton visit to Seattle and Vancouver December 2012

Christopher Norton visit to Seattle and Vancouver December 2012

I met Olive and Anthony Yau at the MTNA in New York in March 2012 – Olive has a flourishing piano teaching studio in Kirkland, Seattle (www.oliveland.com) and is also the Washington State representative for the ABRSM. Her studio becomes an examination centre for the “Board” twice a year. Olive has known my music for quite a while – she had already bought it in Hong Kong (her original home) and Japan as well as in the USA. She is definitely a fan! At MTNA, I introduced her to American Popular Piano and we also talked about the Piano Festivals that have started to spring up in different parts of the world. She resolved there and then to get me to Seattle for a similar event.

I went back to the UK and the build-up to the 2012 Olympics began. I got an email from Olive saying that she and Anthony were coming to the Olympics and asked to meet, which we did - at a central London venue that got regular visits from US Olympic competitors! Here I am with Olive: 

  

Olive and Anthony then invited me to come to Seattle and Vancouver in December 2012 and do a variety of presentations to both teachers and students. This proved to be a different style of event from the Piano Festivals, in that I worked with groups of students and teachers in a free-wheeling way, sometimes emphasising chord playing, sometimes right-hand improvisation, sometimes doing a master-class (which often involved the whole group playing along) Good fun! Here’s a picture of me with one of the many groups:

Olive and Anthony had ordered copies from across my (piano) product range – Microjazz, Microstyles, Preludes and other Boosey & Hawkes books, all of the Connections series and of course American Popular Piano. Here’s part of their very impressive display of books:

I did hands-on workshops with teachers, masterclasses with students and an introduction to my music for all-comers. I also compered and played in a concert at Bellevue Presbyterian Church, which was a wonderful event.

All of this was to introduce me to teachers and students in Seattle. In preparation for my return visit in June 2013.

My second port of call in Washington State was at Prosser Pianos, a very impressive piano and Roland dealer in Tukwila, Washington. I talked to small groups of teachers and students most of a day and was able to give comprehensive demonstrations of both my material and the improvisation methodology found in American Popular Piano. Again, this was a way to drum up interest in a much larger event in June 2013 and this seems likely to happen at Prosser Piano as well, who have already staged Roland Piano Festivals in past years. Here’s a  picture of me working with 2 Tukwila teachers, who had a really good time by all accounts:

Incidentally, the rather exciting live performance on Youtube of Chicken Feed from the Jazz Preludes (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTZWTME9TLU) was filmed at Prosser Pianos.

We then drove to Vancouver, where I was a guest of the BCRMTA (British Columbia Registered Music Teachers Association) who were having their Christmas lunch and kindly allowed me to do a presentation before it. I had quite a few teachers up to improvise and played quite a bit myself and there was a lot of interest in a Vancouver Piano Festival next June. Here I am mid-presentation:

This whole trip was a very generous gesture from Olive and Anthony, who are trying to figure out the best model for the return visit.Whatever it is, it will be the beginning of an exciting new phase for me in the USA.

Christopher Norton, London UK 19^th December 2012

Christopher Norton in Christchurch, New Zealand 10th October 2012

Christopher Norton workshop in Christchurch, New Zealand, 10^th October 2012

I was pleased, right at the very end of my Australasian sojourn, to give a presentation to the Christchurch branch of the Registered Music Teachers Association (www.irmt.org.nz)

My presentation was organised by my first composition teacher, superb piano teacher and life-long friend Rosemary Miller Stott (www.sounz.org.nz/contributor/composer/1177)

My brief was broad – to talk about ensemble music and improvisation and to conduct a masterclass on 2 Rock Preludes that have recently been listed by the ABRSM (Sierra and Sturdy Build)

The ensemble section of the talk featured the Two At A Time series, published by www.fourhandsplus.com, American Popular Piano and Microjazz. I was helped by various members of the audience, all gamely sight-reading in public. Here are some of them hard at work:

I pointed out the virtues of playing duets (especially how it cultivates the notion of listening to another part as well as your own) and of starting with very easy 5-finger student parts allied to musically interesting teacher parts. People enjoyed the on-the-spot music-making and could see lots of potential for teaching and for student concerts.

I also talked about adding backing tracks to the equation, using tracks from the APP series as well as the relatively new tracks from the Microjazz Collections.

With video clips from all over the world as well as our in-house renditions, this was a very enjoyable session. I finished with a reference to Microjazz Trios, finishing with the by now infamous Canadian and Italian versions of Free’n’easy from YouTube.

The improvisation session was using APP Repertoire and Etudes – I gave a quick overview of how the teaching of improv works at the early Levels. The audience were very interested in this and many will go away and explore the material with a view to using it themselves.

Near the end I did a masterclass with 2 teenage boys – both had started learning Rock Preludes quite recently but they certainly had the notes and overall style well in hand. I was able to concentrate on technical matters – fast staccato octaves, ff chords in both hands, genuine legato etc. The audience could hear what a different sound could be produced by analyzing some of the mechanics involved. Here is one my two students at the piano:

The audience included people I have met on other occasions, including my other favourite Christchurch couple – Colin McLachlan and Christina Sell McLachlan.

And one family who came included a non-piano playing mother who enjoyed being asked to play the piano in public for the first time:

This was a very happy occasion – just the right mix of people came: teachers, students, general music fans… and it felt like a genuine exchange of ideas had occurred. I have already had some nice feedback from this session on the Christopher Norton – Composer Facebook page.

Christopher Norton

Christchurch, New Zealand, 11^th October 2012

Christopher Norton at Otago University, Dunedin 8th October 2012

Christopher Norton at Otago University Music Department, Dunedin, New Zealand 8th October 2012

Dunedin is my old home-town – I went to school there (Otago Boys High 1966-1969) and did my first music degree there from 1970 to 1974. And I met my wonderful wife there, also a music student. So it was with great pleasure that I agreed to give a talk about my life and work to students and staff of the music department at Otago University.

The present head of the music department was there – Graeme Downes. He is in a very impressive Dunedin band, The Verlaines (www.theverlaines.co.nz) and is an expert on both rock music and Mahler!

The person who invited me was Anthony Ritchie (www.anthonyritchie.co.nz), an associate professor in the department, and a very fine composer himself. His works number over a hundred, and include three symphonies, two operas, seven concertos, choral works, chamber music and solo works.

Also present were three generations of my family – my 85-year old mother (still bemused after all these years by what I do!) my younger sister and her daughter Jessie, who is a composition student in the department currently.

The students and staff were given a brief description of my life as a composer, including my beginnings in Dunedin as a schoolboy writer under the watchful eye of Rosemary Miller and later in the department with Jack Speirs and Don Byars. I had lots of video clips and played as well and I think it was deemed to be a stimulating, even enlightening session. Here are some of the fresh-faced and eager audience members:

And a French horn player who played in my Octagon Overture (see my blog about this event at www.christophernorton.blogspot.co.uk) is pictured here. And yes, that’s my mother on the left..

The current Mozart fellow, (www.otago.ac.nz/otagofellows/mozart.html )Robbie Ellis (www.robbie.co.nz) was also there and quizzed me about whether a full-time composer might have to be really a part-time composer and a part-time marketing person (I agreed!) He played some duets very nicely with me.

Thanks to Anthony Ritchie and the students and staff for providing such a warm welcome – I hope to keep in touch with you all!

CN Christchurch, New Zealand 9^th October 2012

Christopher Norton Piano Festival Townsville, Queensland 2nd & 3rd October 2012

Christopher Norton Piano Festival Townsville, Australia, 2^nd, 3^rd October 2012

I have fans around the world, but I also appear to have a much smaller number of hard-core fans. One of these is Heather Smith, owner of Townsville’s The Keyboard shop (www.thekeyboardshop.com.au) who is a Yamaha dealer and a dedicated exponent of all things midi. Heather happened to be on holiday on Perth when I presented on my January tour and she saw me there. She was instantly converted to American Popular Piano as a course and has relentlessly pushed it ever since, claiming it is without doubt the best method on the market, full-stop! She organised the Townsville event and it was the biggest Christopher Norton Piano Festival of the tour, with over 70 students and quite a few teachers participating.

Each Festival has been subtly different – this one was very different from the others in one crucial respect: the students had prepared their 2 pieces and at least the first Module of each accompanying Improvisation Etude. But that was it – no solo pieces for the masterclass. So I either got them to play one of the APP pieces they had prepared or I asked them to play something already in their repertoire. So we had quite a mixture of pieces, including the Batman tv theme, computer game music, Jessica’s theme from The Man from Snowy River and Chopin’s Minute Waltz! This gave me more time to work on improvisation and I was delighted by the response of the students and the almost 100% success rate. By success rate I mean that every student created their own ideas and repeated, varied and extended them.

Here are 2 of the improvisation groups at work:

The concert was a sell-out and all of the participants enjoyed a chance to play music they liked in a non-competitive context.

CN Christchurch NZ 9th October 2012