A Very Happy New Year! I wish you all a wonderful, healthy and happy 2026. We galloped through 2025 at such speed that I hope 2026 will slow down a little! There are many events and projects in the pipeline over the course of the coming year. A few highlights include several forthcoming publications: a…
Tag: Play it again: PIANO
Pre-Christmas Cheer
It’s December already and we all know what that means: Christmas time, for those who celebrate. After a busy term, which, for me, finished yesterday, it’s good to have some time to reflect on the past few weeks and look forward to the festive break. The Play it again: PIANO Prep Book (Schott Music), which…
Composer of the Month at TopMusic
2025 starts with a bang! During January, I’m ‘composer of the month’ at the TopMusic.co which is an educational organisation founded and run by Tim Topham, a music educator who I had the pleasure of meeting when I visited Australia last Summer. Earlier this week ten of my elementary piano pieces were published by TMS…
A Keynote Speech and an Asia-Pacific Adventure
On June 29th I embarked on my largest and certainly longest book tour to date. This one had taken considerable preparation and financial support from both Schott Music and Hal Leonard Australia. These trips are usually fun, inspiring, fascinating and educational, and this Australasian extravaganza was nothing short of amazing. The tour started in Singapore…
5 Tips To Help Develop Finger Control
My most recent article for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter focuses on honing firmer fingers for clear and crisp articulation. Rapid passages. They require extra practice, don’t they? You sit down at the instrument, ready to start a practice session, and begin at the same quaver, semiquaver or demisemiquaver passage which caused some grief at the previous…
Touring in Singapore and Malaysia
If you’ve been following my social media sites, you’ll know I’ve been working in Singapore and Johor Bahru (in Malaysia) over the past week. I aim to organise several overseas book tours per year as I love to travel, and I also enjoy meeting teachers and students from different parts of the world. I’m extremely…
Play it again: PIANO Book 3
Play it again: PIANO is a four-book piano course intended for adult and teenage pianists who have played the piano before and are ‘returning’ to enjoy this pursuit. Book 3 follows directly on from Book 2 of my series. As a recap, Play it again: PIANO Book 1 and 2 were both published in 2017, and…
Play it again: PIANO workshop at the Frankfurt Music Fair
I’m really looking forward to giving a presentation and workshop at this year’s Frankfurt Music Fair or Musikmesse which takes place from April 2nd – 5th. My workshop will be held on Thursday April 4th at 2.00pm. This presentation focuses on Play it again: PIANO Book 1, 2 and 3. Book 3 will be officially…
Five New Year Tips to Seriously Improve Your Piano Playing in 2019
Happy New Year! It’s January 1st 2019 and I hope you have all enjoyed a wonderful Christmas and New Year’s Eve. At the start of any new year, we make resolutions, create new goals, or perhaps re-evaluate or reflect on existing goals. It’s the perfect time to revisit our hobbies, or investigate new ones. Many…
Basic Tips for Healthy Piano Playing
Earlier this month I presented a workshop for piano teachers at Millers Music in Cambridge. This activity will become increasingly important during 2019. Schott and I have organised several workshops across the country. I’m really looking forward to meeting and working with teachers and students. The following article was published on Millers Music shop website…
Piano teaching in Asia 2018
I have just returned from another enjoyable and successful book tour. This tour was the busiest yet with visits to four countries and multiple cities; Singapore, Malaysia (Melaka and Kuala Lumpur), Indonesia (Jakarta and Surabaya), and Hong Kong. On this trip I was fortunate to have company: I gave teaching workshops alongside colleagues Samantha Ward,…
A Far Eastern Book Tour
Book tours are fun. They could be referred to as the ‘pinnacle’ of the whole writing journey. By this time, the books are safely published. The writer can now speak about the process through those rose-tinted glasses. This week I leave for my third book tour over the past year, retracing my steps in the…