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About John Martin
As pianist and Music Director John has worked with many stars of the Australian and international concert and theatre scenes, including duo recitals and broadcasts with clarinettist Deborah de Graaff, and in trio combination with Deborah de Graaff and flautist Leah Lock as “Power Of Three”, cellist Susan Blake, singers David Hobson, Marina Prior, Mark Vincent, The Australian Tenors (including tours of Western NSW in 2015 and much more from 2002 onwards)courtesy of Australian Global Entertainments, The Ten Sopranos (including a tour of South Australia in 2017), showman violin virtuoso Vov Dylan, Teddy Tahu Rhodes, Amelia Farrugia (including flautist Jane Rutter’s “Live At Lunch” series at the Concourse, Chatswood NSW in 2019), Julie Lea Goodwin, Yvonne Kenny, Jacqueline Porter, Greta Bradman, Jose Carbo (including The Albany Festival and other recitals in 2019), and Geoffrey Chard, to name just a few.
In October 2019, John joined forces again with Mark Vincent in a mini tour of NSW and Victoria with a Mario Lanza tribute programme.
John has also worked with many of the best instrumentalists, and toured China in June 2018 with Jane Rutter, presenting classical recitals in some twelve different cities. In 2019, from July to November, Jane and John did a scattered Australian tour with legendary Music Theatre star Peter Cousens. In late 2020, he performed the 1st Beethoven Piano Trio in company with violinist Myee Clohessy and cellist Catherine Barnett in two performances as part of the Highlands Music Collective at St. Jude’s, BowraL, NSW Southern Highlands, then joined Teddy Tahu Rhodes and Jane Rutter for concerts in Coffs Harbour, Newcastle and Avoca Beach. These three were together again on March 31st 2021 as part of Jane’s “Live at Lunch series in the Chatswood Concourse.
He has also worked regularly with theatrical luminaries such as Miriam Margolyes ( tours of “Dickens’ Women” in 2008 and 2012, tour of “The Importance of Being Miriam” 2015), Penny Hackforth-Jones (“the Spoken Garden” in 2000 and “The Spoken Interior” in 2001), Amanda Muggleton (many performances, including storytelling with music of Hans Christian-Anderson’s “Wild Swans” on ABC Classic FM and at Sydney Opera House, 2016) , Meredith O’Reilly (including “Curtains” and “The Way We Were” in 2019) and Stuart Maunder (including two seasons of “Noel, Cole and Gertie” in 2008), as well as many up-and-coming young performers in both the classical and cabaret genres. He was MD for “Bells Are Ringing” and “Working” for Federation Uni TAFE Music Theatre Course, 2017 and 2018.
2022 saw performances of John’s solo show “Noel Coward—Master of Arts”, followed by further performances in 2023, and in March 2023 “Let’s be Outrageous—Noel Coward, Cole Porter and the Sophisticates”.
John has recently done several concerts in Sydney and Canberra with Turkish star soprano Ayse Goknur Shanal. They are about to go to Western NSW to do two concerts to raise awareness of the threat to water supply from mining of the Pilliga State Forest. In April they will be performing an ANZAC concert in Canberra.
John is very frequently to be heard on radio, especially ABC Classic FM (where he has been the subject of several week-long feature spots) and the MBS Network both as soloist and associate artist, and has championed the works of many Australian composers. He has had a long and happy association with his great friend Ann Carr-Boyd and has for many years enjoyed the pleasure of performing and recording her music, many of these recordings being now available on the Wirripang label. Their latest collaboration “Ann and John” (2022) is soon to be released, once again on Wirripang.
Other Wirripang recordings include “Ancient Rivers”, “Another Look at Autumn”, “Tunes for Mademoiselle”, and “Ring Out Wild Bells”, this last being a collection of works by Australian composer Miriam Hyde.
John and Vov Dylan have in post-production “Embroidered Colours”, an Australian selection of violin and piano works, for Elkwood/Sony (an affiliate of Sony Japan) to be released in some 21 countries. In March 2021 John recorded “Rhythms of Green and Gold”, another Australian collection of solo piano works now released on Move Records, Melbourne.
At the time of writing, this album has just entered the Aria Classical Album chart top 20!
Many of John’s own compositions are available through Wirripang Publications, including two volumes of piano works, “Livewire” and “Silk”. His published works also include many songs for voice with piano, duo works for violin and piano and choral works.