Christopher “Kit” Taylor is an incredible pianist. That’s not just my opinion. According to his bio, he is “hailed by critics as ‘frighteningly talented’ (The New York Times) and ‘a great pianist’ (The Los Angeles Times), [who] has distinguished himself throughout his career as an innovative musician with a diverse array of talents and interests.” Early in 2015, I had the opportunity to photograph him in a faculty recital at the UW-School of Music. There was no good place for me to stand on the main floor of the recital hall so I went up to the balcony With fewer people there I had more room to move around and find a place where I could catch his actions and the expressions on his face. As usual, after the event I submitted the best ones to Kathy Esposito.
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About a year later, Kathy asked me to accompany her when she went to interview Kit Taylor about a project on which he was working. He was building a Hyperpiano at the Morgridge Institute for Research. This project came about when he discovered that the University of Wisconsin had a Steinway piano from the 1920s that had a double keyboard. It’s the only such piano that Steinway ever built. Taylor’s plan was to build a high-tech double keyboard which would electronically control two devices that would sit over the keyboards of two separate pianos. From his double keyboard he would be able to play two separate pianos. Students began to refer to this as his Frankenpiano. Despite the name, none of the parts appeared to be stolen from graves and Kit didn’t need a bolt of lightning and sparks to bring it to life. A plug in an outlet was all that was needed. Two months later we went back to see what progress he’d made.
Later that year, three days before Halloween, Kit gave a public performance on his Frankenpiano. I went in early to get some pictures of him setting up his keyboard and connecting the “electronic fingers” to two grand pianos. Then he warmed up and practiced for awhile. When the concert started, almost 700 people filled the hall, curious, I assume, to see and hear what this new instrument would sound like. Taylor described it to the audience and then began playing Bach’s “Goldberg Variations.” In the midst of the concert, the electronics caused a little glitch. Taylor, totally unfazed, stepped behind his keyboard, knelt down to make an electronic adjustment or two, and then continued playing without additional problems. At the end of the concert the audience gave him a standing ovation. Afterwards they were invited up to get a close look at the hyperpiano and talk to Professor Taylor.
Two years later I had the opportunity to enjoy hearing Kit play Leonard Bernstein’s Symphony #2 with John DeMain and the Madison Symphony Orchestra (MSO). I hadn’t anticipated it, but prior to that event, one of my photographs of Kit received a lot of exposure. It was used in an ad in Madison Magazine, the Isthmus and the Wisconsin State Journal. The MSO used it in their publication The Score, their Silver Anniversary Season program, on the cover and in a story in their book of program notes for the September – November 2018 concerts, and on an oversize postcard about their November – December 2018 concerts.
After the series of Christopher Taylor concerts were completed, Peter Rodgers, the Director of Marketing for the MSO gave me one of the 30″ x 66″ event posters that had been hanging in the Overture Center. When I went to his office to pick it up, I assumed it would just be a large rolled up poster. It was, however, mounted on 1/8″ foam core. So, as I walked three blocks back to the parking ramp, I had to carefully adjust this “sail” in the light breeze to stay on course.
When I started photographing for the School of Music, I assumed that my focus would always be on music students or faculty. At about the same time as the Frankenpiano was unleashed, however, I was asked to photograph the groundbreaking for the new Hamel Music Center that would be going up next to the Chazen Museum of Art on University Avenue. Although events like this are important for kicking off big projects, they aren’t the most exciting to photograph. There was singing, music from both faculty and students, including the UW Marching Band playing while standing still. There were also some speakers and, at the end, I got the requisite groundbreaking image of people holding shovels who probably hadn’t held shovels in decades, if ever.
About a year and a half after the groundbreaking, Kathy Esposito invited me to come along to tour the partially constructed Hamel Music Center. We visited again five months later on a tour given for the generous people who donated to this project. On both tours we donned hard hats and descended into the bowels of the building. One of the project managers led us around and pointed out various aspects of the design. Due to the future use of the building, much of the construction was designed not only to give the best possible sound inside the concert halls, but also to eliminate as much sound as possible from outside the concert halls. They did this, in part, by essentially constructing three separate buildings inside a larger building. You can read more about the engineering details in Civil+Structural Engineer Media.
I won’t spend time writing more about the construction tours here. You can read more about them and see many more interesting photographs in a blog post called Some construction required.
The official ribbon cutting and opening of the Hamel Music Center was held on October 25, 2019. Although my photos can give you a feeling for what this music center looks like, you really have to go there — 740 University Avenue, Madison, Wisconsin — to appreciate it.
The facilities include the Mead Witter Foundation Concert Hall, which seats 651 and has 10 wheelchair spaces, the Collins Recital Hall, which seats 293 and has 6 wheelchair spaces, the Sing Man & Florence Lee/Annette Kaufman Rehearsal Hall, a recording studio and dressing rooms.
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