Welcome to the Pianola Partnership's website.
Here you will find news of the concerts and other activity undertaken by the partnership, as well as background information about the Pianola instrument and its great versatility.
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Michael's return invitation to the National
Musicians' Church, Holy Sepulchre Holborn Viaduct, as part of their 2023
Summer Music
Festival, took place on Tuesday 15 August to a warm audience, who enjoyed:
A Children’s Overture by Roger Quilter
Mazurka Opus 10 No 1 by Edward Elgar
Five Studies for Pianoforte by Dorothy Howell
Five Pieces for Pianoforte by H Balfour Gardiner
and Peter Warlock's Capriol Suite for Piano Duet.
Michael played to a full house in the Elgar Room at the Royal Albert Hall on 14 April, the first time that the pedal Pianola has featured there in the Hall's 150 year history.
(Photo: Catherine Rounce)
The following day he appeared at St Paul's Knightsbridge for the Royal College of Organists playing the Moszkowski transcription of Chanson Boheme from Bizet's Carmen. You can watch it here.
Michael's midday concert on Tuesday 9 August 2022 was his contribution to
the Summer
Music Festival at Holy Sepulchre
London (the National Musicians’ Church). The enthusiastic audience
enjoyed:
Three English Dances Op 11 - Roger Quilter
The Towing-Path - John Ireland
Miniature Suite - York Bowen
Javanese Pepper Dance - Josef Holbrooke
Two "Pierrot" Pieces Op 35 - Cyril Scott (No 1 Pierrot
triste, and no 2 Pierrot gai)
Sentimentals No 1, Colonial Song - Percy Grainger, and Shepherd's
Hey (Specially arranged by the composer for the Pianola).
The concert was live-streamed on YouTube, and recorded. You can watch it here.
Michael was able to make a last-minute pre-Lockdown appearance on Wednesday 4 November 2020 for Potters Bar United Reformed Church's Autumn Lunchtime Recital.
As you would expect, social distancing was observed by the few lucky members
of the church audience, but thanks to the wonders of Zoom, it was possible
for many more to watch at home. Fritz Kreisler and Carl Maria von Weber were
included in Michael's programme, and if you click on this
link you'll see pictures and a video of his appearances (please note,
you will have to scroll down quite a way to find him, although the images
are arranged in date order. Better still, search the page for 'Broadway').
Keep checking here
for news, and we'll bring you up to date details of any further Partnership
events.
***
Michael works with several musicians, composers and actors including:
Vaninne Parker, soprano
Vaninne Parker studied at the Royal Academy of Music, where she won major
awards. She has sung for the English Music Theatre Ensemble, Scottish Opera
and Kent Opera, where she was also a leading contributor to the company's
education programme. Roles for this included Countess (Figaro), Alice
(Falstaff), 2nd Lady (Magic Flute), Miss Jessel (Turn of
the Screw), Lucy Lockit (Beggar’s Opera), and Agrippina.
Following a Wigmore recital debut, Vaninne has long enjoyed a wide variety
of concert and oratorio commitments in London and the south-east, singing
works as diverse as Charpentier's Te Deum, the Bach Passions
and B Minor Mass, the Poulenc Gloria, Mozart's C Minor Mass
and Britten’s Ceremony of Carols. At the Millennium, she was
a soloist in the world premier of Alan Bullard’s Prime Meridian.
Richard Suart, Baritone
Richard was born in Lancashire, and studied at St John’s College, Cambridge,
and at the Royal
Academy of Music.
He began his operatic career with the English Music Theatre Company and Opera
Factory, and is now
much sought after, particularly in music theatre, contemporary opera and as
a comedian in the more standard repertoire.
Recent engagements include Pangloss (Candide) with the LA Philharmonic
Orchestra at the Hollywood Bowl, Mr Walter (After Life) in the Holland
Festival, with L’Opéra National de Lyon and at the Barbican,
Playing Away in Bregenz and St Pölten, French Ambassador (Of
Thee I Sing), General Snookfield (Let ‘Em Eat Cake) and
Barabashkin (Paradise Moscow) at Opera North and in Bregenz, Baron
Zeta (The Merry Widow), Lesbo (Agrippina) and Ko-Ko (The
Mikado) at ENO, The Mayor (Jenufa) for Opera Holland Park, Lord
Chancellor (Iolanthe) with the San Francisco Symphony, Don Jerome
(The Duenna) for English Touring Opera, The Tell-Tale Heart
at ROH2, Salad Days at The Riverside Studios and the Judge (Trial
by Jury) for RTE in Galway and Dublin.
John Blood
John studied composition, piano and cello at the Royal Academy of Music in
London where he won the Eric Coates composition prize. To pay the bills, John
also found work in films - as a pianist in Lady Chatterley’s Lover and
in an advert for Pot Noodles. Later, Sir Arthur Bliss's widow gave
him the job of cataloguing the great man's private music collection and provided
the surroundings for him to work on his own compositions. Freelance work for
the music publisher Novello followed. He's now a director of Gonzaga
Music.
Among his many creations are Sonatina, Nor’wester Caprice, Dark
Scenes of Winter, the ballet Little Boy Lost and a concerto for
trumpet, oboe and strings, Boreas. He was commissioned to write for
the 1981 St Ives Festival in Cornwall. Other work includes The Christmas
Card, Periwinkle Duo, Viente Divertissement, Babar the Elephant,
Manton Heights, The Christmas Express, Esthwaite Elegy, and for the pianola:
The Witches of Hawkshead - Tarantella Diabolica.
Michael Broadway and Bill Bingham at the
2002 Three Choirs Festival in Worcester.
© Anthony Seldon
These links will take you to YouTube audio and video recordings by Michael:
The first movement of Benjamin Dale's Piano Sonata in D minor.
Presto from Moritz Moszkowski's From Foreign Lands, Op. 23 - II. Italian.
Claude Debussy - Suite Bergamasque no 3
Leo Livens - Three Studies
Roger Quilter - Three English Dances
Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov - Flight of the Bumblebee
There's more information on other pages of this website, or you can telephone
the Partnership on
020 7254 6145.
Watch this space for news of music rolls and other items you will be able
to purchase through the Pianola Partnership.
(Website updated:33 February 2024)
