Piano Pedagogy - Learn Like Emily Bronte

Did you know that you can look at historical piano teaching materials in the libraries that hold legal deposit collections?  Nowadays, there are a handful of big national and university libraries in the UK that still receive one copy of everything published, under statutory legislation.  But there are other libraries - especially in Scotland - that also received this material, until the beginning of Queen Victoria's reign.

Theodore Latour was pianist to King George IV - Victoria's uncle.  He taught, played and composed, and also wrote some piano tutor books.  See a quick 90-second videoclip about him, here.

Latour - Piano professor & the King's Pianiste on Biteable.

• https://biteable.com/watch/latour-piano-professor-the-kings-pianiste-1902905/ 

It's possible to find copies of some of Latour's works online via Google Books, IMSLP or Archive.org, so if you're interested, we could help you source them.

And yes, Emily Bronte had music by Latour in her collection.  How do we know?  There's a book by Robert K. Wallace that tells us so!  (Emily Bronte and Beethoven: Romantic Equilibrium in Fiction and Music).  We don't have this book, but could get it on inter library loan if any of our readers were interested.

Girls at the Piano, by Virginia Lloyd

We've just heard of a brand new publication by Australian Virginia Lloyd, taking a historical AND contemporary look at girls and their relationship with the piano.  Are we going to buy it?  Of course we are!
Read the publishers' blurb here.

3rd Manhattan Music Competition

We've been notified of this competition for piano, strings, and singers. No transport required. Details all online, deadline 28 February 2018:-

• https://www.manhattancompetition.com/

Mozart Sonata K.331 (Alla Turca finale) Autograph Fragment Online

Newly discovered autograph fragment 

Mozart's famous Sonata in A major, K. 331 (with 'Alla Turca' finale)

The Hungarian National Széchényi Library has just launched a website to make this precious manuscript freely accessible to all:- http://mozart.oszk.hu/index_en.html

Balázs Mikusi (mikusi@oszk.hu)

Head of Music

National Széchényi Library, Budapest 

You will also be delighted to hear that Henle is producing a new Urtext edition of the sonata - there's a video about it here.

Una Hunt Plays - The Wild Irish Girl and her Harp, Friday 25 July 2014

We've heard about an intriguing radio recital from Ireland.  It takes place this Friday evening, 25th July.

THE WILD IRISH GIRL AND HER HARP

… a portrait of Sydney Owenson, Lady Morgan

 

on The Lyric Feature

 

25 July 2014               RTÉ Lyric fm            7-8pm             96-99fm

 

A portrait of the extraordinary celebrity cult figure - Sydney Owenson, later Lady Morgan, who penned the once-famous novel - The Wild Irish Girl (1806). In addition to her writing, she also enjoyed a flourishing career as a drawing-room singer and performer on the Royal Portable Irish harp built by John Egan. Sydney Owenson styled herself on Glorvina, the harp-playing princess from her novel, thereby initiating a fashion for her own brand of pseudo-Celtic dress, and she also composed some quite influential songs, a fact that is no longer recognised.

 

Music on the programme includes specially recorded world-premiere recordings of Owenson’s Hibernian Melodies performed by Laura Murphy, mezzo soprano and Una Hunt, piano, along with harp airs played by Boston-based Nancy Hurrell on John Egan’s harps. Contributors include Nancy Hurrell, Claire Connolly (Professor of Modern English, University College Cork) and Julie Donovan (George Washington University, Washington D.C.). Engineering by Ben Rawlins.

 

Presented and produced by Una Hunt.

 

A Heritage Music Production for RTÉ Lyric fm. This programme is made with the support of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland's Sound and Vision Funding Scheme.

 

LISTEN BACK

The Wild Irish Girl can be heard live on the internet through the RTÉ lyric fm website and can be accessed at any time for a week after broadcast.  Just go to http://www.rte.ie/lyricfm/features/ and click the 'LISTEN BACK' icon to hear the current feature. Thereafter, the programme is available on the Lyric fm Archive."

North London Piano School - International Summer Course 2014

North London Piano School Summer Course

Piano and Violin

16 -23 August 2014

Gala Concerts 23 August 2014

Website: www.learn-music.com/nlps2

Pianist Leo Blanco Coming to Glasgow

Leo Blanco

Music journalist Rob Adams is keen to share with us the fact that Leo Blanco will be playing in the forthcoming Glasgow Jazzfest.

Rob tweets that Blanco is "Brilliant pianist, Berklee piano prof, playing Glasgow Jazzfest, touring UK".

Always keen to pick up a good story, Whittaker shares the Jazzfest website with you:- 

http://www.jazzfest.co.uk/

Blanco is performing in the City Halls on 26th June.  Don't miss it!

96 years ago, before there was an International Women's Day

Whittaker is sorting through a donation, and encountered Rev H. R. Haweis' book, Music and Morals.  Intrigued, we glanced at the contents page.  The heading, 'People who play the piano' looked interesting.  Are pianists more or less moral than other folk?

"Most young ladies play the piano as an accomplishment.  A girl's education is as much based on the pianoforte as a boy's is on the Latin grammar, and too often with similar results." [...] " ... the piano makes a girl sit upright and pay attention to details ..."

 No, it's not being added to stock.  Good to know that times have changed a bit, though! See my earlier posting, today.

Piano Competition - Mayenne, France 24-26 May 2013

A competition at the Conservatoire of Le Grand Nord in Mayenne, France.

6e Concours International, 'Piano a Mayenne'

24-26 May 2013

For more info, visit the website:-

• Competition details on Conservatoire website 
• Le Grand Nord homepage

Another Summer School - Piano in Stadt Fellbach, Germany

Stadt Fellbach Musikschule

13th Summer Masterclasses for Piano

26 July - 2 August 2013

Today, Whittaker received details of this summer school for pianists.  It's under the direction of Klaus Hellwig (Berlin).  For more details, click here.

Piano masterclasses with Robert Levin (Leipzig)

Masterclass 13-17 November 2012

'Whittaker' has just received notification of piano and piano chamber music masterclasses with Robert Levin in Leipzig this November.  More details on the Bach-Archiv Leipzig website - here.

Another posting for our Summer Schools and Courses page!

Wiesbaden Highlander K. James Peace, tango composer: new DVD

K. James Peace in Wiesbaden

An interview with the

Scottish tango composer,

who performs some of his

own piano tangos (DVD)

K. James Peace has donated a copy of this DVD interview to the Whittaker Library at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.  Library patrons curious how a Highlander ended up writing piano tangos in Wiesbaden, will need to borrow it!  Find it here.

If you're not a patron of the Library, but are fluent in German, you can visit the Wiesbadener Tagblatt (newspaper) to read a news item about the tango-ing Highlander.  More recently, Mr Peace has also been interviewed for a Spanish website, Música Clásica.  Click here (Spanish text).

Short courses at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland

Planning for the summer holidays?

Come and enjoy a short course led by our expert team at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.  More info here ...

Piano I (30 July – 3 August: 5 days)

Piano  II (6-10 August - 5 days)

£450/£850 for both

Fali Pavri, Aaron Shorr and a team of guest artists including our International Fellow in Piano Steven Osborne.

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Jazz Performer (30 July – 3 August :5 days) /£450

Tommy Smith, Alyn Cosker, Tom MacNiven, Paul Harrison, Chris Grieve, Mario Caribe and Kevin MacKenzie

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Chamber Ensemble (6-10 August : 5days) /£450 per trio, £600 per quartet and £100 per performer thereafter.

Robert Irvine, Jacqueline Shave and Jane Atkins

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Classical Singing

(20-25 August : 6 days) /£495

Stephen Robertson with guest teachers Timothy Dean, Professor Christopher Underwood, Helen Lawson, Mark Hathaway and guest artists Judith Howarth (soprano) Clare Shearer (mezzo-soprano) Iain Paton (tenor) and Julian Tovey  (baritone)

iPad 2 or a human page turner?

Pianists and their page-turners

Read wind supplier June Emerson's blog.  Who would have thought an iPad could replace the silent human helper at your elbow?