Seeing as Edd has done such a fine job in summarizing the weekend?s activities, I will briefly draft a few personal responses to the first Amsterdam events.

Admittedly, I had a somewhat of a crisis before making the trip. It had been many years since I had the chance to write for so many instruments (a trio being the largest ensemble I have written for in the last 3 years!) – having all those sound possibilities at your disposal isn?t as luxurious as one might think!

Additionally, my high regard for the Nieuw Ensemble compounded my anxiety; I felt the pressure of the ?this piece needs to be amazing?-syndrome.

Well, that caused all sorts of problems! Personal drama aside, I eventually did get a few morsels of material scribed, I thought they had potential to be stretched and explored in a workshop.

Satisfyingly, the first day?s workshop was a real success for me. The sounds produced were interesting and the players seemed to be authentically engaged with the material and possible extensions of it. Looking back, I?m also very pleased with how I led the workshop too - quite a miracle considering how anxious I was that week
before!

As Edd has mentioned, Pat and I stayed in that night and furiously produced some material for the next day. Our thoughts were along the lines of: ?if the Nieuw Ensemble is at your disposal, make the most of it!? I think Steph and Edd had focused on this before the workshop, impressively producing considerable amounts of work. I also admired how Pat quickly rendered something strikingly cohesive and assured for Sunday?s session.

I went away from the workshop feeling galvanized. Jöel had been generous to us all in his comments. I was personally heartened and encouraged by what he had said. I have been thinking about the work to be done since the workshop, ideas since then have been multiple and disparate: I?m intrigued to see how things (un)fold. The main thing that I think needs addressing is form: how to enable the evolving material to have multiform applications within the (probably tiny) space that I delineate for the sounds themselves.

Finally, I know Pat and I (perhaps Edd and Steph too?) feel that having now met some of the players that will be playing our music, we feel that there is a connection established. I hope that there is a feeling that we are working together to create something; I?m writing for them now, not blindly to some imagined figure as before the first workshop. The fact that they were also so understanding, open and genuinely enthusiastic is extremely beneficial for any composer willing to take risks and extend themselves; I?m certainly willing to fail whilst attempting!

Johnny Herbert

I stayed up late on Thursday evening sorting out the programme and the collation of all the new techniques and approaches and questions and Bob stayed up much later editing the first draft of the film of the children.

I was really pleased that on editing the material I discovered that every child had directly invented at least one new technique or approach. Thirteen new inventors, composers, choreographers and creative people who hopefully won't have their playful creativity squashed or repressed as they age into primary school and beyond.

Friday morning - we went to the nursery. We re-arranged the room, and Bob set up the projector and the AO white plastic projector screen on the piano. We welcomed in the children, their staff, some friends from the LBT, some other children from the school, the head-teacher, some of the adult group and lots of parents all on the floor or very small yellow chairs. In fact we had a parent/relative or carer for every child apart from one.

Later we chatted to the parents who really enjoyed it and though, in many cases, their offspiring did not directly talk to them about the project, there was enough energy or buzz about what was going on to inspire the mums and dads in. Emma and Isobelle (nursery staff) were really pleased and surprised by the turn-out.

Pat and I played a tune on melodica and recorder, we watched the film Bob had made (about 9 minutes) and then uncovered the piano. There was much playing at this point, which we curtailed after about maybe seven minutes. Very interesting to observe two girls who had not been in during the week, but came to school on the Friday. One, named Pearl, was clearly in need of having time to play the piano on her own as all the other children had, but in this context it was not quite possible. She looked very disappointed as every time she played others accompanied her.

The room got very hot and there was a real buzz. We ended with 'If You're Happy and You Know It', Five Little Monkeys and the Piano Bedtime Lullaby.

During the afternoon after we had watched Liz reverse ever so slowly and slightly into a taxi, we had a quartet rehearsal (Jac, Pat, Bob and I), trying out ideas from the new techniques for the evening. Some we tried and rejected, others we tried and felt that they would be great without further 'rehearsal', others we knew would work without even rehearsing.

The duet of Pat and Jac with elbows on piano was very wonderful to observe. Also nice to have a time to play, especially for Bob who had been so tied up in his filming, documenting and observing that he had not really had time to 'play'.

At 6.30 we gave a performance of Piano Dances in St Paul's Hall. I prefaced it by playing simultaneously two-pianos in a new phasing piece. We then watched the newly edited film which Bob had worked on in the afternoon. Finally a series of new pieces in solos, small groups and full group (22 performers).

NEW PIECES

1.    A Spell for the Piano  - Based on Question 21
2.    Solos Together - Everyone chose one new technique or approach from the list, but especially Approach 15
3.    Playing Other People's Hands - Developing Technique 6
4.    The Piano Fairy - Inspired by Question 13 and also Approach 27
5.    Full-Group Bob - Starting from Approach 31 and going elsewhere...
6.    Graceful Elephant Teapots - Using Technique 4 as a starting point
7.    Kneading - A small group performance of Technique 7
8.    A Line Around The Piano - From Approach 4 and Questions 3, 9, 10 and 11
9.    Putting The Piano To Bed - Approach 40 and Question 15?

My favourites sonically were 'Kneading' - a kind of mix of Messiaen and Ligeti - and 'The Piano Fairy' - a wonderful original conceit. I also loved the choreography of 'Solos Together' and performing in 'Putting The Piano To Bed'.

We ended by bestowing a professorship of Keyboard Choreography upon Jac Gaile (prof KCC), only the second such position in the world.

Most of the performers went to a nearby Thai restaurant for a meal afterwards. Very lovely to be together socially. I instigated a Japanese tradition which is at the after-performance party to share round and read the evaluation forms together. They were all (all the ones that Heidi had collected) very positive and effusively generous. We shifted tables and managed to talk with most people, and then home late and tired, but with a very warm and harmonious feeling.

The day after Piano Dances Pat and I travelled south together, leaving Huddersfield and its sleet for the sunshine of South Devon. We were performing at the Plymouth Contemporary Music Festival, a programme of live music to a selection of silent films. We were chatting with Eduardo Miranda, the festival director, and explaining Piano Dances and he was very intrigued and enthusiastic. 'Maybe you should come and do it here next year?' So maybe we will. Roll on volume 4 of Keyboard Choreography wherever it may be.

Now I need to find some time to sleep.

Hugh Nankivell

Now finished all the workshop sessions at the nursery and with the adults. A real contrary emotion of a day.

In the evening the group made beautiful keyboard choreography and there was a clear feeling of a group and a shared energy. There was much laughter, thought and some tears.

As Hilary left she asked 'what am I going to do next week without you'? She played a beautiful piano solo while looking at her self-portrait, but prefaced it by saying that she couldn't play the piano. Of course she could.

In the morning, Jac led the session and we drew happy pictures of ourselves and Jac asked us whether the piano was happy or sad and what its name was and whether it was a girl or a boy?

Everyone did portraits and most then put the portrait onto the piano and played from it. There was some energetic and delicate solo playing and also a mix of group playing, but a lot less playing of the piano than on the previous days. It really felt like the piano was becoming part of the furniture of the nursery.

Serenna was obviously not well (she kept holding her ear and looked very sad) and her playing was without bunny-hops and was very doleful. Sophie again played and squeaked and was FULL of joy and Gael played with great confidence. There was quite a long stretch of time today without much attention paid to the piano and there were far fewer new techniques and approaches that we discovered, but by contrast there was lots of repeat-playing of earlier material.

Today there was a picnic at the piano and phone calls using cheese and calculators.
We ended with singing together and I led a lullaby story-song for the piano which had the following lyrics before we put the piano to bed and covered it up.

Bed time
Twinkle twinkle
Night night
Night night.

When we analysed the video in the afternoon we had a very good discussion about what age it is that a child loses the un-self-conscious-playful-exploration? This came about because one girl (and only one) seemed to play the piano mainly to attract adults attention or to be noticed and she was very clear about what we could or could not do at the piano (no picnics for instance!) whereas the others played it without reserve.

The new things we discovered were:

Techniques

1.    Play a note and hold it down, then add other adjacent notes and hold them down. Then take the hand off and do the same again. use thumb sparingly. Smudging. Serenna.
2.    Play with both hands. Only using index fingers. Contrary motion at all times, firmly. Contrary Index. Gael.
3.    Sit under the piano and play with the pedals with your hands. Pedal Hands.  Lautrelle and Chloe.

Approaches

1.    Draw a picture of how you feel. Put the picture on the piano. Play.
2.    Place your score on the keyboard, covering some of the keys. Play.
3.    Phone someone up and ask them to play the piano with you. See what happens.
4.    Play your own hand, (from day one).
5.    Play while jumping at the keyboard, synchronised or unsynchronised. Morgan.

Questions

1.    Is the piano a boy or a girl?
2.    Does the piano have a name?
3.    Is the piano happy or sad?
4.    When you put the score on the piano music stand how do you know which way up it should be?
5.    Is the piano in good working order?

We have now made a set list for tomorrow evening of new pieces all of which are generated from the playing we observed in the morning. Our set-list will include

A Spell for the Piano
Solos altogether
The Piano Fairy
Full-group Bob
Playing other people's hands
Graceful Elephant teapots
Kneading
A Line Around The Piano
Putting The Piano To Bed.

We will have a sharing at 11am in the nursery and show them a compilation video with parents and friends and then a 6.30pm concert in St Paul's.

We ended the session this evening talking about how tomorrow we will be playing a different piano from the one we have developed a relationship with during the last three evenings and whether this is adulterous behaviour. The piano has been developing a character in a way that I have not experienced before, but perhaps I have been careless and fickle in my past piano dealings as, although I love the acoustic piano very much, I have in my time lost both a grand piano and a player piano.

Hugh Nankivell