Christopher Norton North American Grand Tour June 21st - July 5th 2013

Christopher Norton Grand Tour June 21^st – July 5^th 2013

This tour came about because I had a request to attend the CFMTA (Canadian Federation of Music Teachers’ Associations - www.cfmta.org) in Halifax, Nova Scotia in late June/early July 2013. I suggested to the President of the Association, Lorna Wanzel, that I could attend if a Christopher Norton Piano Festival in Halifax preceded the conference. And she agreed! Working backwards from the convention, my energetic US agents, Olive and Anthony Yau (www.oliveland.com) set about arranging a number of pre-conference events in Kirkland, WA and in Victoria, Vancouver and Richmond, BC.

Kirkland (www.kirklandwa.gov) is a lovely lakeside suburb of Seattle on the shores of Lake Washington. Olive Yau has a thriving piano teaching studio there, which also doubles as an examination centre for the ABRSM. Olive is originally from Hong Kong, where the ABRSM is "the" music examination system and she first became acquainted with my work because of pieces listed on the ABRSM piano syllabus.

As readers of my occasional reports may know, I have been to Kirkland twice before, once to introduce myself to teachers in the Seattle area and a second time to put on a Christopher Norton Piano Festival. This time Olive and Anthony, her businessman husband, decided to bill the event more like a Summer Camp, with an exciting array of activities available for selection in addition to a basic package of improvisation group, master class and Gala Concert. Here is the list of activities that were on offer:

A total of 138 Camp “slots” were booked and a terrific time was had by all. I had great support from various teachers/helpers and the participants enjoyed both improvising and performing. Here are some photographs of the event, including a picture from above, a group photo and a close-up of 2 young participants:

The event culminated in a lovely Gala Concert, which co-incided with my 60^th birthday! The entire audience sung Happy Birthday and a cake was produced and cut:

I then travelled to Victoria in British Columbia and did a mini-Festival at Tom Lee Music, with improvisation and master classes. Then 2 much larger events, one in Vancouver, the other in Richmond. In Vancouver I had 19 students at once, all with full-sized keyboards!

And here is a lovely shot with students during one of the workshops:

Here is one of the master classes in Richmond:

Tom Lee Music were very pleased with all three events and would like me to come back and do bigger events in 2014.

And so to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where I did a more standard Christopher Norton Festival, organized superbly by Shahien Hamza and Lexie Blackler:

Shahien and Lexie are keen to do a larger event next year as well! And so to the original reason for going to North America – the Conference in Halifax. Apart from 2 presentations, I spent quite a bit of time on the stand of the local music dealer, playing and chatting to teachers. The final dinner was a lovely chance to see my many Canadian friends, including the redoubtable Gunars Balodis, the co-founder of Music for Young Children:

This was a most enjoyable Grand Tour and I hope to do it all again on an even grander scale in 2014!

Christopher Norton

London 3^rd September 2013

Christopher Norton at Clement Pianos, Nottingham, UK April 21st 2013

Clement Pianos has been trading in Nottingham for 90 years. To quote from their website (www.clementpianos.com)

Established in 1919, Clement Pianos are now a third generation family business. Owners Mick & Andy Wilson, both of whom are piano technicians, trained by some of the world's finest, have spent many years carefully selecting what they consider to be the ultimate instruments in each class and price category.

Apart from their wonderful piano showroom and recording studio, they also run the Nottingham International Jazz Competition (http://nijpc.com) which was won in 2012 by Jeremy Siskind, who I know well from various conventions in America and who always comes and does a duet with me on the APP stand. Small world! Here’s Jeremy (www.jeremysiskind.com)

Clement Pianos has a selection of sheet music for sale in the showroom and decided to put on a Christopher Norton event, partly due to the enthusiasm of a teacher who came to my last Nottingham presentation (see the report on that workshop at http://christophernorton.blogspot.com/2012/09/v-behaviorurldefaultvmlo.html)

The presentation at Clement Pianos started with American Popular Piano, introducing the series but also immediately launching into simple improvisation. Students and teachers had a go at this and one of the teachers did particularly well:

The audience were very interested in both the Repertoire and the improvisation Etudes and looked at the books on sale with great interest in the interval:

The second half was all things Microjazz, with video clips of students from around the world as well as performances by me and by some students who had learned the pieces for examinations. This was also of great interest to the audience, especially the backing tracks for Microjazz and the wealth of online resources now available on Youtube and Facebook.

The idea came up of both another, longer workshop day and also of a Nottingham-based Piano Festival. I hope to see some or all of the teachers and students again sometime soon.

 Christopher Norton, London, UK 24^th April 2013

Christopher Norton at Messe, Frankfurt 12th and 13th April 2013

Christopher Norton at the Frankfurt Music Fair (Messe Frankfurt) 12th – 13^th April 2013

The Frankfurt Music Fair is the big European event for music retailers and I have attended it for at least 20 years now! As always, I stayed at the delightfully named Hotel Hammer in Mainz. The picturesque Mainz railway station is across the road from the hotel:

I was at the Messe for the 2 public days, so was able to talk to customers as well as to dealers. One highlight was meeting a flute player who met me at the Messe last year and had bought the Concert Collection for Flute. She liked it very much and was interested to hear that the Sonatina for Flute and Piano as well as the 2 Microjazz Flute Collections were now available to listen to on Soundcloud (as well as being for sale from www.boosey.com) http://soundcloud.com/nortonchristopher/sets/sonatina-for-flute-and-piano/ 

Here she is with the composer:

The head of publishing at Boosey & Hawkes, James Eggleston, was at the Messe and while we were there we were able to do quite a few useful things. One was to meet with Sarah Holcroft, the person at Faber Music who is overseeing the building of my new website (www.christophernorton.com) Another was to talk to a dealer who wants to do editions of Microjazz for Absolute Beginners and Microjazz for Beginners in Italian and Spanish. Here’s James with the Italian dealer (James is on the right):

I showed James scores and music of some of the pieces from my new Micro Musicals. These will be the first featured new products on my new-look website (which should be ready by August) I’ve written 5 Micro Musicals so far and they are suitable for children in years 3 to 6. Piano scores, backing tracks (including “teaching” tracks) dialogue and suggestions for staging will all be part of a series of useful packs. And each Micro Musical can be taught in one day and lasts no longer than 20 minutes!

Workshops in Belgium, Germany, Italy, Spain and Sweden were all discussed with dealers – more details will follow.

This was a low-key event – numbers at large Music Fairs are diminishing – but was worthwhile for strengthening links with European dealers and for getting the chance to speak direct to customers. And of course it was great to see colleagues from Schott and Hal Leonard US as well.

Christopher Norton. London April 17^th 2013

Christopher Norton writes 5 Micro Musicals!

Christopher Norton writes 5 Micro Musicals – February 12^th &13^th, March 20^th-22^nd, March 25th & 26^th 2013, Davies Lane Primary School, Leytonstone, east London and Selwyn School, Highams Park, east London

I’ve worked for many years with an excellent cellist, Robin Thompson-Clarke.

In his own words:

I first met Chris while working as a professional cellist. I was asked to play on John Pantry's album "Simple Sailing for Beginners' (CN: available for download at www.christophernortonpublishing.com) As luck would have it, there were a couple of solo cello parts and Chris was very complimentary about my playing. He offered me the opportunity to work with him over the following years and I played cello on at least 40 albums, including 4 solo albums. During this time I “fixed” musicians for Chris for many albums and as well as working with Chris, I have also acted (and continue to act) as his agent from time to time.

While working together we became friends and have remained so ever since. I gave the first UK performance of his Sonatina for cello and piano and we are due to record it in the near future. As well as continuing to work as a professional cellist, including teaching at the Royal College of Music, I am now also a fully qualified primary school teacher, working in an East London school as part of the senior leadership team and as their Advanced Skills Teacher for Music.

Robin asked me to come to the school he teaches at, Davies Lane Primary School in Leytonstone, and both create and teach 3 musicals effectively “from scratch”. I was given the themes, but was otherwise free to do what I liked, as long as 8 songs could be taught in a day to around 60 children from one year group!

Davies Lane school is a very tall building, a Victorian monolith at the end of a suburban street:

The first musical was based on A Christmas carol and naturally had songs for Scrooge, the three ghosts and Bob Cratchit. I wrote the words as well as the music and was quite amused at the relish with which the students spoke the lines of the first song, I hate Christmas!

To quote Robin again:

The 'Musical from Scratch' workshop with Chris was a fantastic success. He worked alongside the teachers from a whole year group of 65 children, to create a musical based on Charles Dickens's ' A Christmas Carol', which they had been studying. From the very start all the children were engaged, eager to contribute to the lyrics of each song. Children who were normally reticent about singing were completely involved. As the day progressed, Chris developed the ideas, adding instruments, body percussion and even 'whiteboards' to accompany the songs. Solo singing and small groups were also added. Chris's music, original and contemporary, brought a sense of the 'West End' to this East London school; an experience few had or would ever participate in. Would I recommend you invite Chris to your school-a wholehearted YES!

The second musical was based on the legend of Beowulf and was suitably blood-thirsty and dramatic. The students relished the mixture of symphonic rock and heart-felt ballads, as well as the chance to do dramatic speaking over music.

A few weeks later I went back to Davies Lane Primary School and Robin and I worked on the music, adding vocal harmonies and some canonic ideas as well as working with drummers, guitarists and tuned percussion. Meanwhile other teachers had worked on a script which would help tell the story in dramatic form, as well as costumes and set design. At the end of the second day’s work on each musical, we performed 4 songs, with additional dialogue and staging, for an enthusiastic audience of parents, other year groups and teachers.

A third musical, based on the Vikings, was also devised, this time for year 3 students and its subsequent staging will happen as well.

I also went to another school, Selwyn Primary School in Highams Park (also in east London) and wrote and taught musicals based on Queen Nut – an Egyptian theme – and Theseus and the Minotaur. Return visits will also see these worked on further and presented as staged concert performances.

Visits of a similar nature to other schools are already planned in May and June.

If the idea of Christopher Norton coming to your school to either teach or write a Micro Musical is of interest to you, in the UK, get in touch with Robin Thompson-Clarke at robintc@me.com. For North America, contacty Olive Yau at olive@oliveland.com.

Musicals written so far:

A Christmas Carol

Bewoulf

The Vikings

Queen Nut

Theseus and the Minotaur

Christopher Norton

London, UK 29^th March 2013