Zig Zag Art Gallery Exhibition music

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I had a wonderful time playing some of my favourite piano music at the Zig Zag Cultural Centre’s Art Gallery in Kalamunda a few weeks ago. It was the launch of the three-artist M.A.M.A. exhibition, which runs until 5th July 2015.

Over about two hours I played my Androgyne Prophecy (1977) and lots of pieces by Bach, Chopin, Schumann & MacDowell. This was all for ‘background’ or setting a mood, and many people told me how much they liked my playing and liked the effect.

The three artists in the exhibition are Anne-Marie Wharrie, Christiana Gagiano, and Sultana Shamshi. The guest speaker on opening night was Dominic Savio, monk and artist. Danielle and Sophie, daughters of textile artist Anne-Marie, took some great photos (below). There was a large and enthusiastic crowd most of the time.

It was nice to catch up with Andrew Partington (with the cap), a fellow UWA music student from way back.

This lovely exhibition is called M.A.M.A. (Mother.Artists.Mother.Artists.), with all the dots,  because these roles (being a mother and being an artist) keep getting interrupted. See http://www.wharrie.com/index_Page1344.htm and http://www.zzcc.com.au/

Anne-Marie is now making me a really nice fabric covering for my digital piano to replace the temporary one used on the night. Then I’ll be all set to play for more launches!

See my second blog post about Anne-Marie’s art. She used an original piano composition of mine as the sound track for a video:
http://mixmargaret.com/blog/2015/08/01/zig-zag-gallery-video-now-online

.20150605.07 MDJ at Zig Zag7220150605.10 MDJ at Zig Zag7220150605.12 MDJ at Zig Zag, pic by Danielle W 7220150605.13 MDJ at Zig Zag, pics by Danielle W 72

Peter Clark tuning my piano

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Peter Clark is here as I write, tuning my 1903 Thürmer upright piano. And no doubt doing a great job. He’s tuned it several times over the last two years.

He found it had gone very sharp through the middle which often happens in winter. And he will fix the broken damper pedal.

I’m NOT going to go into the details of the very sorry tale about how my lovely old piano ended up with damaged hammers before I found Peter apart from saying this: contact Peter for all your piano tuning and repairs. He’s brilliant. If he says he can fix it, he can!

See his very interesting site at www.perthpianotuner.com.au or call him on 0417 927 594.

Piano tuner Peter Clark

Photo of Peter holding the pedal.

Amphitheatre doco in Revelation Film Festival

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Years in the making: this independent 87 minute documentary called “Parkerville Amphitheatre: Sets, Bugs & Rock n Roll” will be screened at three cinemas around Perth on 4, 11 & 12 July 2015 (Luna Palace, Cinema Paradiso & Luna on SX).

Jenny & Susie of Tempest Productions have done a great job with this massive project to collect material and interview lots of people who were associated with my late father, John Joseph Jones (1930-2000), and his amphitheatre (1966-2001). Kickstarter crowd funding helped them buy rare ABC television footage from the 1970s. They’ve fashioned a compelling story out of all the twists and turns, the big and little dramas, the private family story, and the very public story.

See a brief history of the amphitheatre and links to the doco and how to buy tickets, plus some myth busting at: www.parkerville-amphitheatre.com

The official name of the amphitheatre was The Seddon Vincent Memorial Theatre for Australian Playwrights.

http://facebook.com/MixMargaret

Remodelled Soul Tree Organic Café

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Today I played piano in the new-look café. It’s quite a different shape and now has a long wooden wall down one side. Everyone said it made the digital piano sound really nice & warm with a rich, full tone much more like an acoustic piano.

A Facebook friend from uni days, flautist & teacher Linda Rossen, turned up with her mother, Iris, and her composer/guitarist son, Max. During my break it was so good to catch up in person. Iris requested Chopin so I played five of my favourite mazurkas. It was very nice to have three pairs of very finely-tuned classical music ears to play for! (Sorry, didn’t get a photo.)

Later my brother Lawrence, and his ladyfriend Lori (direct from Oklahoma City), came in for an organic beef burger. Great to finally meet the lovely Lori in person.

I played a couple of Jones originals: Kuljack and the White Swan (a pas de deux), piano music for ballet which my father composed in 1962 when I was one, and my own Androgyne Prophecy, composed when I was 15/16. Now Lori wants my music for her school teaching so I will have to prioritise my recording project.20150614.04 Soul Tree, Lori & MDJ72 20150614.15 Soul Tree, LJJ & Lori72

See my main site for Classical Sundays at Soul Tree Organic Cafe

Caramel Splash (smoothie) at Soul Tree Organic Café

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Caramel Splash (smoothie) at Soul Tree Organic Café

On Saturday I had lunch at the cafe in Glen Forrest (and the next day I played piano there). Marilyn (one of the cafe owners) had shared a post on FB about a Choice magazine article on sugary drinks so I really wanted to check out her smoothies which she said were “super healthy, organic smoothies.” See her post at https://www.facebook.com/soultreecafe/posts/503076996498034

I’m particularly keen to avoid or reduce consumption of fructose so I asked her what was in her Caramel Splash. I really wanted to know if it had any kind of sweetener in it.  BTW, it tasted GREAT, and the caramel taste is not achieved with any sort of caramel flavouring thingy nor by heating sugar (nor anything else).

Turns out they have three smoothies made with almond milk, and three made with mostly water. If I remember correctly the Caramel Splash is about three-quarters almond milk, plus banana, Maca, mesquite and date. And that’s it.

So, the sweetener is fruit i.e. fructose. However, it begins as whole pieces of fruit and not fruit juice, which must mean there is not really a lot of fructose in the glass and it’s going to take longer to be absorbed. The almond milk has no sugar of any kind. (Soul Tree also sell fruit juice which I would never drink because of all the fructose in it but some people like that and that’s their business.)

So, my conclusion is: safe to drink, nutritious, and absolutely delicious.

Blogs consolidated

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Today (1st February 2014) I’ve started this new blog and imported all the posts from the previous two blogs (which was not many). So now it’s all in the one place:

mixmargaret.com/blog

Previous were: piano.mixmargaret.com/piano_blog and singing.mixmargaret.com/voice_blog

Getting used to digital pianos, finally

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Excerpt from an email to the MD and Director of NINE (see previous post).

Hi Sarah & Paul.

I’m getting used to the digital piano. As you know, I have one myself but they’re so different to real pianos. On digital pianos the keys are slippery, the touch is wrong (and can cause muscle pain, esp. if the foldback is not right), and it can’t make all sorts of finely graduated tone colours etc. It’s even harder to hit the right notes.

However, I’m now coming to see the unique qualities of digital pianos, through playing the Roland so much at Roleystone. You can get a really useful left hand bass (providing people stop messing about with the dials), and other sounds, such as harpsichord. The other real thing for me is the different tone colour, which I’ve slowly begun to appreciate.

The different tone colour, somewhat bell-like, has inspired me to start composing a new work, being my first composition specifically for an electronic instrument. It’s written with that bell-like quality in mind and doesn’t sound right on an acoustic piano.

So, from that, you can see that I have travelled a long way (not just in kilometres). I don’t want to give up the real piano, of course, but I’m much more comfortable with the digital than I used to be.

The whole show has been a very pleasant experience, and a nice little challenge after having been away from music theatre for a long time.

NINE the musical at Roleystone Theatre

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What a great cast of singers! (And they’re not hard to look at, either). This is one of the best live musicals I’ve been involved with. It even boasts a contestant in the current Miss Universe contest playing a leading role.

NINE is a musical re-working of the film 8 1/2, which was a semi-autobigraphical work by Frederico Fellini. A new film, being a re-work of the musical, was released world-wide in December 2009. This is the Perth premiere of the musical.

Anyway, you can hear yours truly at the digital piano (with other instrumentalists) for eight performances only at the Roleystone Theatre on Brookton Highway in the Perth Hills. We’re playing 8pm on Wed, Fri & Sat, starting Friday 19 November until December 4, 2010.

Check it out here:

http://www.roleystonetheatre.com.au/web/Coming%20Attractions

http://www.aussietheatre.com.au

REVIEW: http://www.theatre.asn.au/theatre_reviews/nine

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nine_(musical)

Victoria Newton at The Ellington Jazz Club

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Wow! What a performer!

But this is something I already knew, having been to Victoria’s Farewell gig at the Perth Hyatt something like 17 years ago, just before she moved to the UK. And I have dim memories of her playing clarinet when we were both at UWA.

The Ellington is new to me, it’s a great venue and quite cheap. Very well thought-out, you can sit at tables or pay less and stand at the bar. I did neither—simply couldn’t stand still with such exciting music, so I practically danced at the bar. While the music’s on you are not allowed to talk (if you must chat, you can go upstairs where the show is on a plasma screen or something like that), which is really good.

This is the email I sent to Victoria:

“Just wanted to say I really enjoyed the gig at the Ellington last Saturday. You had me moving to the music the whole time, I never stood still. That’s pretty good, considering I don’t dance.

Strange to observe, though, that most of the audience didn’t move to the music. I always thought that was a peculiarly classical audience thing (I rarely attend jazz performances). What is it with some people? Why don’t they tap their feet or something?

And what a wonderful programme you devised, absolutely inspired. The slow blues number by Ella someone [not Fitzgerald] really hit the spot, wonderfully sung and just at the right point in the programme (such a perfect contrast after the other, off-the-beaten track numbers). The other blues, Humdrum or something, was another highlight.

You may have almost converted me to jazz!! And Tal [Cohen, pianist], OMG, what an improviser!”

They were all great improvisors: piano, string bass, guitar, drums, vocals.

See http://www.myspace.com/victorianewton
http://www.victorianewton.co.uk/
http://www.ellingtonjazz.com.au/

Kathy Corecig’s site

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Bumped into Kathy Corecig (nee Potter), viola player, at Zenith Music the other day. Hadn’t seen her for years. I was accompanying a couple of string players and she had a couple of students playing there, in the Catholic Schools Festival of Performing Arts. Apparently, they have 1800 participants!

Anyway, Kathy is a composer and plays in several ensembles. On her very original-looking website you can see videos with her film music scores. She’s a wonderful musician and with one of her groups, Viola Dana, she’s put music to lots of old silent movies. ‘The General’ by Buster Keaton is a lot of fun. See http://www.corecig.com/videos