Bill Lockley Outreach Scholarship | NSW Saxophone Award | Outreach Music NSW Clarinet Award |Old Bills Musical Life
Bill Lockley Outreach Scholarships
Outreach Music has established a scholarship fund in memory of our dear friend, Bill Lockley, to assist talented, young regional NSW musicians with their studies with Mark either in person or via distance learning. These Scholarships can be applied for by emailing Jo Walton
The Sydney U3A choir has for many years donated money directly to regional children through Mark’s outreach programme but recently the choir made a significant donation which prompted us to set up the Bill Lockley Outreach Scholarship Fund. Bill himself left Mark his violin and with the blessing of his family the proceeds will go into this fund.
We would like to thank all those who have spontaneously and generously made donations which have now been transferred into this new fund. Any further donations will be most gratefully received and acknowledged.
The criteria for these scholarships are the following
- A serious commitment to and love of music.
- Above average musical ability
- A commitment to school and or community music ensembles
- Financial need
Bill Lockley who died in 2008 lived an extraordinary life and did so much for other people. One of his significant and enduring achievements was establishing the legendary Camp Creative, held annually in Bellingen. Bill’s lifelong love of music and his conviction that everyone should have the chance to learn an instrument immediately struck a familiar chord with us and like so many others, we will always treasure his friendship, humour and unstoppable energy.
A few years ago, Bill wrote an interesting article for the Yamaha Music Connect Magazine – you can read it here
The Outreach Music NSW Clarinet award
Congratulations to Mitch Richards for being the first recipient of the NSW Clarinet Award.
Mitch is a very talented saxophone and trumpet player from the central west town of Parkes. He plays in the Parkes Town Band and in the Forbes District Town Band and hopes to make music his profession.
Mitch will have the use of this wonderful Yamaha wooden clarinet for the next 12 months and be the recipient of a Bill Lockley Scholarship to study the clarinet with Mark via the internet.
Every year Mark Walton lends out a Yamaha 450 wooden clarinet with silver plated keys to a student who needs a fine instrument to learn on. If you would like to be considered for the loan of this excellent clarinet please email Mark Walton with your application.
The criteria for this award are
- Your teacher must write a reference stating your serious commitment to playing the clarinet
- You must be preparing for an AMEB exam in the coming year
- Not be in the position to purchase a quality instrument of your own.
- You must be a resident of NSW.
This fine instrument was donated by a generous benefactor
The Outreach Music NSW Saxophone Award
Every year Mark Walton lends out a Yamaha 475 alto saxophone to a student who needs a fine instrument to learn on. The recipient for 2008 is Som Howie, an extremely talented student currently studying clarinet at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. If you would like to be considered for the loan of this excellent saxophone please email Mark Walton with your application.
The criteria for this award are
- Your teacher must write a reference stating your serious commitment to playing the saxophone
- You must be preparing for an AMEB exam in the coming year
- Not be in the position to purchase a quality instrument of your own.
- You must be a resident of NSW.
Old Bill’s Musical Life
My parents, who were surprisingly proud of me, told the world that my urge to play a violin was first evidenced about age three when I put the hairy end of a hair brush under my chin and started sawing away at It with a comb.
After I’d ruined about a dozen brush and comb sets my parents decided it might be cheaper to buy me a violin.
At age 5, with a half‑size fiddle, I started lessons with Florence Webb at Hurlstone Park, I sent “Florie”, as we students affectionately called her, to an early grave (in despair) when she was still quite young and I was about 16.
Looking back on it they were great days. We (Florie’s students) played all over the place ‑ at church concerts, at our own annual recitals, at the Old Men’s Home at Lidcombe, at Parramatta Gaol and, of course, back in the late twenties and early thirties there was lots of music in the home. One of Dad’s friends was Roy Agnew, the Composer, and another was Vaughan Hanley, who was leader of the W.A. Symphony Orchestra. Roy Agnew told my Dad that young Billy would never amount to anything ‑ “The boy doesn’t even know when he’s in tune!” Things haven’t changed.
Our home was always full of music and musical people. Dad played the piano and the Standard Banjo and ran a Banjo Club. When Roy or Vaughan were playing, people would gather and listen in the street outside the front room. But if we were rich in music we were poor in every other way. I didn’t discover until years later that my Mum flogged what bits of jewellery she had to pay for my violin lessons during the Depression.
I started work in 1935 at £1 a week and stopped learning music at the same time. We still used to play around a lot ‑ particularly at home but then the war came.
After training to fly I was posted to Darwin in the RAAF shortly after the Japs bombed the place in February 1942. We were flying Wirraways (trainers) but later in ‘42 the Squadron was re‑equipped with new aircraft and a group of us went south to collect them. I decided to bring my fiddle back to the Camp but became ill at Charleville on the way back and spent a few days in hospital. My aircraft was parked in the hot sun on the tarmac and the fiddle inside it fell apart. So ended the musical career for close to 40 years.
After retiring to Bellingen in 1978 and getting another fiddle, I joined the Coffs Harbour Community Orchestra. It was pretty painful at first trying to make some sort of reasonable. sound come out of it (the fiddle) but I’m glad I persevered. For the past 20 years (or thereabouts) the Orchestra (and Camp Creative) have been the. musical cornerstones for Old Bill. After attending Mark Walton’s class at Camp Creative in 2003,I’m now learning the Clarinet. Summing it up – I’m back to where. I started ‑ playing out of tune, beyond my time (as well as out of it), in the seconds, and enjoying every beat of it. Well those I see anyway.