These pages will keep track of my travels, my colleagues, my friends, the garden and anything interesting my little digital camera lights upon.
Festival Fun
Rita and Douglas, starring Jennifer Ward-Lealand, premiered...
...at the Wanaka Festival of Colour.
With Jennifer after a show in Tauranga, toasting my 59th.
With Conrad Newport, our director.
Paul O’Brien eats oysters as well as lighting the show and doing 10,000 other things.
Niece Toni came to the world premiere. She won’t leave home without her ironing board.
Philip Tremewan, supreme festival director, took the show to Christchurch despite...
Dressing rooms in Christchurch...
...were a little dicey...
...but I got to play duets with Sarah.
Other Adventures
“So that’s where my brain’s been hiding!”
Would you trust a doctor in a hoodie?
The amazing Parekowhai piano with the artist in the background.
Only Michael Parekowhai could have come up with this. Magnificent!
Speaking of pianos, here is Adrian Mann’s ‘Alexander’ piano - the longest on the planet. Georgina waits for me to get started on the Goldbergs.
Note the mezzanine seating.
One minute’s drive from the farmshed-cum-concert-hall. Landscape from my childhood.
Looking up from Caroline Bay to Timaru’s greatest building. But they don’t know what to do with it.
My first real piano teacher, Sr. Mary Eulalie, died last year aged 102. R.I.P.
Justine after finishing recording the complete works of Douglas Lilburn for violin and piano. Bravo!
Michael Ashby sets up the piano for a recording session at Expressions, Upper Hutt (the fruits of which can be downloaded for free from this website).
The recording team: Kenneth Young, producer; Steve Garden, engineering maestro; Stephanie Cottrill, then Expressions director; MH; Michael Ashby, piano maintainer. Pic taken by page turner, Buz.
One of the treats of my musical life was playing Rachmaninoff with the NZSO and this extraordinary maestro, Vasily Petrenko.
Another brilliant young Russian musician, Sergey Malov, at the end of a huge and highly successful tour.
Wanganui can’t wait!
A lovely pic of artist and WebMaestro, Quentin Roper, and myself on the occasion of the launch of this website.
Quentin has designed the site, done the brilliant animations and removed my fear of computers (if not my ignorance).
We have enjoyed a few glasses of good wine in the process. Cheers, Quentin!