More for Darwyn Aitken
August 23 2009

Last January, the Pianobabbler paid homage to his late music and piano teacher Darwyn Aitken. It was by way of a column in Canadian Musician. See the Pianobabbler's January 21, 2009 post.

Recently I had an email from Toronto blogger, photographer, designer and music video guy Marc Lostracco. He had just bought a house. He saw Darwyn and Peggy Aitken had owned it. Googled them. Found my column.

"Though I don't play an instrument, I work primarily with musicians, and it's so great to know that my house was home to a legacy music... Anyway, if you have anything else to share about him, I'm all ears," quoth Marc.

That led the Pianobabbler back to the notes he made in preparing the Canadian Musician column. Much great material didn't make it in. All of it reminiscences from former students.

So in further tribute, here are more scenes from the colourful, abbreviated time on Earth of the great pianist, teacher, character and human being: Darwyn Aitken.

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from Frank Falco - one of Canada's foremost jazz educators and pianists.

Frank remembered that Darwyn was a small town boy, from South Porcupine, Ontario. Way up north. Unpretentious. He came from a whole other aesthetic.

Darwyn had perfect pitch. He could hear right up to the threshold of noise. Sometimes Frank would arrive at a lesson to find Darwyn dropping his keys on the piano, and grabbing the chord of the notes the keys sounded when dropping. Sometimes the key would make a thud, higher than the last note on the piano. Darwyn would hit the wood at the top of the keyboard.

Darwyn would ocasionally ask Frank to hit a cluster chord. Frank would hit 9 out of 12 notes in the octave. Darwyn would would name the 3 Frank had not hit.

Darwyn had huge stubby fingers. He called them his meat cleavers.

Darwyn inspired Frank [and pretty much everyone else he taught- Pianobabbler.] He had a logical approach. We all want to be able to get better. Darwyn offered the tools. If you practised, it worked.

We are from an improvising background. We don’t have rules. But Darwyn found rules. He had mappings, fingerings, patterns. Consciously or unconsciously, he nurtured pattern recognition. He asked, what’s behind here? He helped to look at the essence of music, finding systems. He found a logic behind the form.

He took an ideological position with his teaching: when you walk in the door, you have to be musical. He could only teach piano. He didn't tamper with your musicality. That was there already.

Ironically though, Darwyn taught in a musical way. He would find the musicality in the student and nurture it out.

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from Jim McBirnie - a pianist especially close to Darwyn, who was a second father to Jim.

Darwyn lived in Canada's notorious 60's hippie haven Rochdale, during the hippie days. As a musician, Darwyn would sometimes be wearing his tux in Rochdale. This, among the stoner residents, and biker security men.

Darwyn was a Mr. Fixit. He loved solving problems. Well-known Canadian pianist Gary Williamson came to Darwyn as a young man. Gary said he couldn’t play fast. Darwyn gave him exercises. It worked in 2 weeks. Gary could play fast.

Darwyn used to say "I could teach a monkey to do scales." It was musicality he couldn't teach.

Darwyn was a heavy smoker, and loved to eat. He smoked unfiltered Camels.

Darwyn respected hard work. He was a father figure. He was meticulous as a teacher.

[When the 911 call came on Darwyn's last day, the paramedic who responded was a part-time drummer working for EMS. Jim's brother, Rod. - Pianobabbler]

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from Lynne Deragon - Canadian actress, singer, songwriter, lyricist.

In her own words:

I was not a schooled musician. I taught myself guitar and piano....just enough to write songs, not to be a player. Then I would hire "real musicians" to transcribe my music or play on the demos. The fact that I couldn't read music always made me feel "less than", or a fraud in some way.

Some of my songs had been recorded. At some point I felt I had to try to study to get over this mental block so I wouldn't feel so intimidated, and could communicate better in musical language.

I made an appointment to "audition" for him in his studio. A little house in east Toronto.

I remember sitting on the hall bench waiting for my appointment. I was so terribly nervous, and through the doors I could hear some fabulous playing by a young jazz student who was finishing up his lesson.

I wanted to run.I almost did, but the lesson finished. Darwyn asked me to come in.

I guess I spent the first while apologizing for my lack of knowledge, and mumbling something about how I was probably in the wrong place. Then Darwyn asked me to play something for him. Play something? I said all I could play were my own songs. "Well, play me some." he said.

So there I was, playing and singing for the great Darwyn Aitken... waiting for him to say he really didn't have room for me.

Not so. He was fascinated. Why did I play in D-Flat? It was easier for my fingers to feel than the key of C, I said, and I liked the darker sound. He smiled. His eyes twinkled. "D-Flat is the most natural key to play in if you haven't been schooled. You've just proved that to me."

I played a few more tunes. He said, "Where did you learn those voicings?"

"I just like the sound," I answered.

He rubbed his hands with glee and said, "We'll begin in two days."

And we did begin in two days. I spent a year with him. Practicing made me have migraines. There was so much work to do. I didn't even know how to read the staff. I used to mark the names of the notes on my music till he told me I'd never learn if I kept doing that. Major, minor, Phrygian, Dorian, Aeolian, Musica Ficta....new terminology.... learn to play All The Things You Are in every
key....learn the Khatchaturian book of Ivan pieces..... learn the Gordon Delamont Harmony book.....!!!!

Three quarters of the way through I said to him that I was no good and was wasting his time. He said to me, "Listen. A monkey can learn the theory. But what you have naturally, I can't teach you....nobody can. Do you realise you've been doing Grade Nine piano pieces ? From zero to Grade Nine! You have an innate sense, even if you don't know the language. Do not give up."

Sometimes we would spend most of the lesson talking, or listening to music. The Late Frank Rosolino had once played me a beautiful ballad he had written. I was to write lyrics for it, so he had sent me a cassette tape of him playing piano and singing the melody. Darwyn wanted to hear it. So one day we just sat and listened, and then he used that song to show me some of the progressions Frank had used as part of the lesson. It was never strictly by the book....it was whatever worked.

He worked me hard. Especially when it came to writing. I had never written to a form, to a specific scale or genre as an exercise. But Darwyn would give me these writing exercises. I remember the very first one I did. I didn't realise I wasn't supposed to put chords under the melody, but that's how I heard it. So that's what I did. When Darwyn saw what I had done, he told me he only expected me to write the melody. Still, he sat down and played the tune with my chords.He was like a child discovering something new. He gave me my first "red star" on the piece. Years later, I finished that little piece after I heard that he had died.

When I think that I got to spend time with the great Darwyn Aitken, I know how lucky I am. I'll be forever grateful.

The biggest and most generous thing Darwyn Aitken gave to me was Permission. Permission to seek. Permission to play from where I was, not to compare myself with anyone else. He was not a musical snob. He was a great teacher.

Over the years the musical pennies are still dropping about certain things Darwyn taught me that I didn't quite 'get' at the time. Whenever that happens, I think: Pennies From Heaven.

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from Buff Allen - a first-call drummer in Vancouver, who studied with Darwyn.

In his own words:

First of all, I always tried to NOT phone him, because when I was in the middle of a lesson, his phone with the incredibly long cord (pre-wireless days, of course) would start ringing in another room, his concentration would get lost, then he'd swear a blue streak up and down as he followed the cord into whatever room the phone was hiding in. By the time he found the thing and picked it up, he was irate, so I was always mused at how actually controlled his gruff "hello" was.

He told me that the phone ringing always meant bad news, it meant a student canceling. I told him to get an answering machine, but he never seemed to quite want to get one.

One time I was early for a lesson. So Darwyn sent me to the Newfoundland grocery store down the street to get cream for coffee (which they never had.... they always had frozen seal flippers, but never the usual grocery store stuff for us non-Newfies.) By the time I returned, the student before me had left. The cat that Darwyn had adopted because it started hanging around ("fucking thing kept meowing for food, so I let it stay") was on HIS chair. Darwyn was affectionately petting the cat, which was purring loudly.

As soon as he heard me come in the door, Darwyn chased the cat off the chair, yelling "shoo", and pretending it never happened.

Another time, I helped Darwyn move some furniture from St. Catherines to Toronto. He didn't want to drive a big van, so he asked me to do so. It was summer, a usual muggy humid day. I brought my dog because we were going to be gone all day. Darwyn got all bent out of shape because of that. ("Why does the damn dog have to come?!")

Part way through the trip, a sudden thunderstorm came up. My dog hated any percussive sound (good dog for a drummer to have!). She was desperately trying to climb up on Darwyn's lap. She was a good-sized golden retriever, not a lap dog. But when Darwyn realized she was frightened, he pulled her up on his lap and started calming her down. He petted her constantly. He told her everything was all right.

Sometimes Darwyn showed these sides.

One thing about Darwyn: he did like to laugh at himself. One time he had his car in for some maintenance. The mechanic was telling him he needed a tune-up, but worded in such a way that it sounded his engine was missing? Darwyn started yelling at the guy. He demanded that they find the engine or he'd sue!

One time I was over at Jim McBirnie's place when he got a call about Darwyn's burglar alarm going off at the studio. If they couldn't reach Darwyn, they'd phone Jim, as he lived nearby. We both went to the studio and opened it up to wait for the alarm guys or police. While we were waiting, we started talking about how Darwyn would get excited about showing you some idea, how he'd thrust one of those meaty paws at the collection of pencils on the piano. Of course he'd miss, but a finger would connect, and launch the pencil in the air, causing him to claw at it like a cat, trying to catch it. But the pencil would invariably end up falling into the piano.

Try as we might, we could never "stab" the pencils into flight the way Darwyn could.

Darwyn often told me: "Hey, have a drink, play a little music, get laid.... what else do you need?"

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Rest in Peace Darwyn Aitken.

You are fondly remembered.

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