About Hugh Wallington

[⚖Hugh Wallington]

My first encounter with music was listening to Charlie Kunz on the radio playing the piano, and it’s his style of playing that inspired me to play the piano.  In my teens we were living in Nairobi, Kenya and I played piano in the school "Dance Band" ... guitar, trumpet, trombone, saxophone, double bass, piano and drums.  We were contracted to play for a number of functions in Nairobi, and spent our summer holidays playing at the ‘Blue Marlin Hotel’ in Malindi, on the coast.  We all played by "ear" and followed the chords decided by the guitarist.  Hence I have never found it necessary to read a music score.
 
Whilst in Malindi I had an encounter with a Hammond Everett Chord Organ.  It had "piano accordion buttons" on the left, a "wrist bar" to "vamp" the chords, and a single foot pedal which played bass and counterbass alternately to whatever chord was being played.  I thought it was the bees knees!
 
Years later I bought my first organ, a Farfisa Balmoral, and later replaced that with the Yamaha AR80.  This was the perfect replacement for the "Band" members.  I now had a band that was always available and did what they were told!  To this organ I added a Yamaha Keyboard, a Casio keyboard and a Leslie Speaker cabinet.
 
I spent some years in Scotland as a young man.  Went to St. Andrew's University (the engineering section was based in Dundee at that time) and joined a Scottish Country Dance Band (as pianist).  The band leader was called Andy Hay (the band inevitably was called Andy Hay and the Haymakers) and he played piano accordion ... completely by "ear" as he didn't read a note of music.  Not only that, he didn't know any of the chords either ... just hunted around his bass section until he found the sound he wanted.  So when I joined I had to record all the songs to tape so I could analyse them and put the chords in for me to accompany him.  He was brilliant.  Used to have the accordion amplified, and would play sitting down, stamping his heel on the ground to the music.  This had a remarkable reaction on the bellows of the accordion and gave the music a sort of "lift".  We had heard Jimmy Shand playing in Edinburgh .. standing in front of a mike, with every note technically perfect, but the music was not as dynamic as ours!  We also used to play the "Rock and Roll" of the day and were really carried away in our music.
 
I now own a Tyros 4 and play using Styles, and create Multi Pads to play those little counter melodies those band members would have played.
 
Hugh

[⚖musicalmemoriesuk]

My first encounter with music was listening to Charlie Kunz on the radio playing the piano, and it’s his style of playing that inspired me to play the piano.  In my teens we were living in Nairobi, Kenya and I played piano in the school "Dance Band" ... guitar, trumpet, trombone, saxophone, double bass, piano and drums.  We were contracted to play for a number of functions in Nairobi, and spent our summer holidays playing at the ‘Blue Marlin Hotel’ in Malindi, on the coast.  We all played by "ear" and followed the chords decided by the guitarist.  Hence I have never found it necessary to read a music score.
 
Whilst in Malindi I had an encounter with a Hammond Everett Chord Organ.  It had "piano accordion buttons" on the left, a "wrist bar" to "vamp" the chords, and a single foot pedal which played bass and counterbass alternately to whatever chord was being played.  I thought it was the bees knees!
 
Years later I bought my first organ, a Farfisa Balmoral, and later replaced that with the Yamaha AR80.  This was the perfect replacement for the "Band" members.  I now had a band that was always available and did what they were told!  To this organ I added a Yamaha Keyboard, a Casio keyboard and a Leslie Speaker cabinet.
 
I spent some years in Scotland as a young man.  Went to St. Andrew's University (the engineering section was based in Dundee at that time) and joined a Scottish Country Dance Band (as pianist).  The band leader was called Andy Hay (the band inevitably was called Andy Hay and the Haymakers) and he played piano accordion ... completely by "ear" as he didn't read a note of music.  Not only that, he didn't know any of the chords either ... just hunted around his bass section until he found the sound he wanted.  So when I joined I had to record all the songs to tape so I could analyse them and put the chords in for me to accompany him.  He was brilliant.  Used to have the accordion amplified, and would play sitting down, stamping his heel on the ground to the music.  This had a remarkable reaction on the bellows of the accordion and gave the music a sort of "lift".  We had heard Jimmy Shand playing in Edinburgh .. standing in front of a mike, with every note technically perfect, but the music was not as dynamic as ours!  We also used to play the "Rock and Roll" of the day and were really carried away in our music.
 
I now own a Tyros 4 and play using Styles, and create Multi Pads to play those little counter melodies those band members would have played.
 
Hugh

Hi Hugh glad to see you here. Welcome to Chello Forum.

[♔Chello]

Thank you for your introduction and welcome to us.
You've been a member for a while, but it's never too late to introduce yourself.

I also play by chords.

[⚖musicalmemoriesuk]

I’ve most recently started to learn the style creator on my Tyros 4 having also done so on my Pa700

[⚖Hugh Wallington]

I had a Style Creator on my AR80 organ and used to use that a lot to change some of the existing PARTS in a Style to suit the song I was playing.  No way could I create a Style from scratch!  So using Style Creator on the Tyros 4 was the perfect way to get the Preset Styles to do what I wanted them to do.

But it was the Multi Pads on my Tyros 4 that really got me going!  Styles have a 'measure' of so many bars, after which they repeat themselves. Although Yamaha use Multi Pads in this way, you can program a Multi Pad to play a counter-melody for as many bars as you like.  To hear an example of this, click this LINK:

https://chellos-keyboard-players-club.co...on-Tyros-4
Hugh

[⚖musicalmemoriesuk]

Ive yet to venture into multi pad creation on my Tyros4.

Im not sure if its possible to copy elements from styles into multi pads as with my Korg..

[⚖Hugh Wallington]

Found a photo of our school 'Dance Band' from 1959!

From left to right: Chris Greaves; Robin Bradshaw; Roger Maudsley; Hugh Wallington; Sam Thompson; Marty Atwood.

   

Managed to contact Chris Greaves a couple of years ago (thanks to YouTube!). He had ended up in Canada and in his spare time made Ukuleles out of wood.

   

This is the email I had from Chris:

       My own introduction to the piano came from watching a fellow pupil play “Love Letters in the Sand”. I was able to watch and copy. Soon I was hammering out “You got me singing the Blues” and “Blue Moon”, “When the saints go marching in” and others. No music…just ear. Later I got a piano accordion by selling my air rifle, so I could practice independently. The school also had a trombone which I took a liking to, mainly because they needed a trombone in the dance band. For scraping through the school certificate my dad purchased a brand-new trombone all of my own.

 
The Dance Band
 
      The dance band consisted of a few, self-motivated pupils who met to hammer out the popular tunes of the day. As the name suggests, it played for many school dances when the girls would arrive by bus from their schools, and everyone had a fine time! As the years go by, some members leave, and they are replaced by other keen up-commers. I loved listening to the band practise at break times…Mini Amos, and later Marty Atwood played the trumpet, Ian Barberton, Hugh Wallington and Robin Bradshaw were successive piano players, David Dawes and Roger Maudsley were drummers, Sam Thompson and Simon Thompson guitarists. There was a double bass player who I don’t remember. After I had mastered a handful of songs I was accepted in as a trombone player. It was great fun…we played for school dances, square dances and the annual Boat Race Ball, where graduates from Oxford and Cambridge raced each other across the dance floor rowing wooden boats on wheels!
 
      The school staff seemed to view the dance band as a distraction. I was warned about taking drugs. There was no coach or musical mentor…we did it all ourselves. One Teacher, Brian “Bung-eye” Norman (he had one glass eye) took an interest and became our agent, booking engagements at various clubs and hotels. We were able to collect a little money from these engagements. He would provide the transportation…no mean feat with a drum set and a double bass, instruments and an amplifier. I remember playing at the Impala Club, Parklands Club, Muthaiga club, the Railway Club, Stima (East African Power and Lighting), Ruiru Club amongst others. Most of our gigs ended at about 1 pm, however New Year’s Eve was special at Ruiru. Here, the large Scandinavian community would party and dance until the sun came up on New Year’s Day. On these nights we needed benzedrine to keep going!   The patrons were always plying us with food, drinks and cigarettes! Perhaps the staff were right….it was a distraction!
 
      Bung-eye also managed an up-country tour of the school hockey team, which we were tagged onto. For 10 days we toured the towns, first playing their hockey team, then playing at a dance in the evening. We would be billeted with the town’s hockey players and community, then drive to the next town.
 
      Our opening tune was always “Mountain Greenery”, followed by other golden evergreens, for example “Ain’t she sweet” and “Mama she’s makin Eyes at Me”. Our Latin American tunes were famous, especially “Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White” with Marty on the trumpet. There were cha-cha-chas, sambas, tangos, a percussion solo, and “La Cocharacha” with my leaad-in on the trombone. There were rock tunes, quicksteps, foxtrots and finally, waltzes. We had a great time, is all I can say!
 
      I forgot to mention, Brian Norman also took us to see Louis “Sachmo” Armstrong and the Dutch Swing College Band on their Nairobi concerts.  He was a good mentor, sadly gone now! I’ll remember those concerts forever.

Chris

If any of you are still around and find this post .. please join Chellos Forum so you can contact me.

Hugh

[✪WilliamD]

HI Hugh.

keep up the good work

Brian