Coffee Day at Northbridge Village

 What a great day we had at the lovely Northbridge Village. This was our first music event since the second Covid lockdown which added to the pleasure. Great audience, great music and a wonderful kitchen for us to enjoy for our lunch. We had a smaller than usual Club member turn-out due to other commitments on the day. However, that made the day more fun in a way as it allowed the playing members to have several turns at playing and in a more relaxed environment than on Club Nights. It was useful also to play the Villages digital ensemble piano which is a Yamaha Clavinova CVP-609 which has touch screen as with our new CVP-809.

It was nice to catch-up with our long-time member, Jim Nicholson, who lives at the Village and who finished off the afternoon for us with his inimitable style of easy listening and sing-along songs that got the audience singing.

A big thank you to our Events Manager, Kay Boyes, for organising the event and also a big thanks to Pat White who organizes activities at the Village.

The Photos: 

Kay Boyes playing the Clavinova CVP-609

Yvonne Moller playing her Korg Pa3X

Claudette Wheeler playing the Clavinova CVP-609

Gordon Sutherland playing his Korg Pa4X

John Holster playing the Clavinova CVP-609

Training Session on new Yamaha Clavinova CVP-809

 The Club's first event after the second lockdown was a training session at our Club premises at the Takapuna Bowling Club. Eleven of our keen players turned-up for a 3 hour session on Wednesday, 14th October 2020 from 2 pm. Teaching us how to access and obtain the fantastic features of our latest and greatest Clavinova CVP-809 was Darren Smith, the National Retail Sales Manager for Music Works who distribute the Yamaha range in New Zealand. Darren went through our list of procedures to guide us and of course because the instrument is now controlled by touch screen it makes it very intuitive once shown.

We are hoping to schedule Darren to be our guest artist early next year so he can show off the wonderful range of sounds and features that this magnificent instrument is capable of. Darren was scheduled to be our guest artist for September but of course the Covid lockdown prevented that Club Night.

Those present gave Darren a big vote of thanks for his time and expertise to demonstrate to us and given his busy work schedule for Music Works.

Photo of our new Clavinova CVP-809 - state of the art from Yamaha