European Suzuki Association - Teachers Newsletter Vol 38 2018

26 I n July this year, there were three teachers observing during our Summer School in Cambridge. One of them was on the CPD course for Suzuki teachers and, on comple- tion, received a certificate from the ESA. Lucie, from Paris, is studying for her level 5 with Huub de Leeuw, and attended the course with his full knowledge. In all probability, it is not well un- derstood amongst teachers that, to attend a CPD course held in con- junction with the ESA, you do not need to have completed level 5. You can attend having reached any stage after level 1. You also do not need to be resident in Europe, as any qualified Suzuki teacher, or a teacher in training, can apply to attend, from anywhere in the world. During the 6 day course, Lucie was present at lessons, con- certs and talks for 42 hours, which is 12 more than the 30 recom- mended by the ESA (well done to Lucie!). For the first two days, Lucie ob- served the master classes given to our students by one of the great representatives of the Hungarian school of piano playing, concert pianist Peter Nagy. The first day of his master classes were on solo rep- ertoire with intermediate and ad- vanced level students and the sec- ond on chamber music with the same group of students (by cham- ber music I mean piano plus anoth- er instrument or combination of instruments, flute and piano, viola and piano, cello and piano, piano trio etc). We have a group of excellent young soloists/coaches who play along- side the students for chamber mu- sic. This means that as well as the older students playing chamber music, our younger students do as well (from Book 2 onwards). It is because I have extensively re- searched the chamber music rep- ertoire that we can offer chamber music to our younger students at an earlier stage in their develop- ment than is commonly done, and because they have very secure partners who give a wonderful model of tone and musicianship to imbibe. At the other end of the spectrum, the most advanced of our older students, aged 17, played with the professionals as part of ‘Pop-art’, a sextet, by our composer in resi- dence Regis Campo. This particu- lar repertoire choice was only possible given the professional soloist level of the players on our staff. Although labour intensive, and therefore expensive to do, it provides an example of repertoire choice and chamber music playing at a high standard, for all the par- ticipants on the Summer School to witness. The piece was played in the final concert at the close of the Summer School to all the stu- dents, parents, relatives and friends present, hopefully lighting the fire of desire in our younger pu- pils to do likewise when they are older, and making it seem that this is just a natural thing they might do. Hearing this advanced repertoire also helps our students and, more importantly their parents, become more used to the idiom of the com- poser. In all, during Summer School, 11 pieces by Regis Campo were played, either by the students alone, stu- dents and staff, or by the staff themselves in concert. We are for- tunate that Mr Campo will return next year to work with our students. Lucie was also able to witness Regis Campo working with the students on the new commission from Cam- bridge Suzuki Young Musicians. ‘Galaxies’ is a set of pieces for two pianos 5 to 7 players, which was given its premier on Thursday 26th July at West Road Concert Hall. We were able to mix our students across the ages playing the five movements and have all 24 attend- ing the Summer School, play togeth- er: a long held dream of mine. An extra thrill was that a documentary about the composer was being Continuous Professional Development Courses Suzuki Multi-Piano Course, Cambridge UK Stephen Power