Nora Violet Johnston (1886 – 1952) was an English
carillonneur and inventor, and one of only two female carillonneurs active in England during the first half of the twentieth century.
Life and career
After an active career in theater, she studied with
Jef Denyn at the
Royal Carillon School in Belgium and earned her diploma on February 26, 1933,
becoming the first Englishwoman to graduate from the school and one of only four women graduates up to that point. Before her graduation, she had already performed 23 concerts on a tour of
Belgium and the
Netherlands from 1927 to 1928. Together with
Royal Carillon School assistant instructor Victor Van Geyseghem, she inaugurated the Jesus Tower carillon of the
YMCA in Jerusalem on April 18, 1933.
It became apparent, however, that as a woman she was unlikely to be appointed to a carillon position. Her struggle with
alcoholism proved an additional barrier.
As the sister of English bell founder and carillon builder
Cyril F. Johnston
Gillett & Johnston was a clockmaker and bell foundry based in Croydon, England from 1844 until 1957. Between 1844 and 1950, over 14,000 tower clocks were made at the works. The company's most successful and prominent period of activity as a ...
, Johnston invented her own mobile carillon, with tone bars and resonators substituting for bells. Production of the instrument cost a considerable amount of money and research.
[Tiffany Ng. "Practice carillon of Nora Johnston", in: ''Catalog of the Municipal Carillon Museum of Mechelen'', 2006: 165.] She travelled throughout England and the United States with the mobile carillon, performing and lecturing. Newspapers often focused on her uniqueness as a female carillonneur, and in 1937 ''
The Washington Post'' highlighted her habit of wearing shorts or
riding breeches
Breeches ( ) are an article of clothing covering the body from the waist down, with separate coverings for each leg, usually stopping just below the knee, though in some cases reaching to the ankles. Formerly a standard item of Western men's cl ...
in order to play the carillon pedalboard. Seeking to establish higher visibility in a field that remained largely closed to women, she appeared on
Pathé News in the 1950 newsreel "'Moo-Sic' Till The Cows Come Home," playing her mobile carillon for cows on the Manor Farm in
Thorpe, Surrey. The experiment was intended to demonstrate that music increased the milk yield of cows.
Johnson was received by
Eleanor Roosevelt at the
White House on her first American tour in 1937,
and performed at the baptism of
Prince Charles
Charles III (Charles Philip Arthur George; born 14 November 1948) is King of the United Kingdom and the 14 other Commonwealth realms. He was the longest-serving heir apparent and Prince of Wales and, at age 73, became the oldest person to ...
in 1948.
As a member of the family business
Gillett & Johnston bellfoundry, she gave concerts on temporary carillon installations at the
Newcastle Exhibition Park, in
Hyde Park
Hyde Park may refer to:
Places
England
* Hyde Park, London, a Royal Park in Central London
* Hyde Park, Leeds, an inner-city area of north-west Leeds
* Hyde Park, Sheffield, district of Sheffield
* Hyde Park, in Hyde, Greater Manchester
Austra ...
where her audience was estimated to number over 100,000, and for Prince George. She inaugurated a carillon-like installation, played from the theater organ console, at the
Regal Cinema in London.
Her memoir, completed on October 14, 1947, was published posthumously by her niece
Jill Johnston
Jill Johnston (May 17, 1929 – September 18, 2010) was a British-born American feminist author and cultural critic who wrote '' Lesbian Nation'' in 1973 and was a longtime writer for ''The Village Voice''. She was also a leader of the lesbian ...
in 2002.
See also
*
References
External links
Records re Nora Johnston, Carillonneur [PRG 422/36/1-5/nowiki>">RG 422/36/1-5">
Records re Nora Johnston, Carillonneur [PRG 422/36/1-5
/nowiki> State Library of South Australia
{{DEFAULTSORT:Johnston, Nora
1886 births
1952 deaths
Carillon makers
Carillonneurs
20th-century English women musicians
20th-century English musicians
20th-century British inventors
20th-century classical musicians
People from Croydon
Royal Carillon School "Jef Denyn" alumni
Women keyboardists