Margaret Miller Brown

Margaret Miller Brown was born on April 22, 1903, in Owen Sound, Southwestern Ontario, Canada.[1] Hers was a musical family.[1] She studied piano under Frank Welsman and Mona Bates in Toronto, and under Ernest Hutcheson in New York.[1]

Brown made her professional debut at the Toronto Conservatory of Music on March 1, 1927.[1] She debuted in London at Aeolian Hall on June 15, 1936.[1] On June 13, 1940, she premiered Ulric Cole's Divertimento with the Promenade Symphony Orchestra.[1] She performed with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the Toronto Philharmonic Orchestra, and in Bates' Ten-Piano Ensemble.[1][2] She was also a featured artist for piano series broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation[2][3] and by radio station CKRC.[4] She performed on concert tours into the 1950s in Canada and, in 1951, in Europe.[1] A 1955 article said she was called "a thorough master of her instrument".[5]

The Royal Conservatory of Music

Brown taught at the Toronto Conservatory of Music (later renamed The Royal Conservatory of Music) from 1924 to 1969.[1] She also taught at the University of Toronto.[1] With her students, Brown was known as a "tough taskmistress"[6] and "extremely rigid in her musical viewpoint".[7] According to a biographer of John Arpin, whose parents engaged Brown for private lessons when he was 14 years old: "Her concept of teaching was to have her students play pieces from a very narrow curriculum, which she selected, using fingering exactly as written, but with 'feeling'".[7] This approach did not satisfy the young Arpin's desire to explore and experiment with a variety of styles besides classical music.[7]

Among Brown's notable students were Brian Cherney, John Coveart, Clifford Poole, Doug Riley, and Clifford von Kuster.[1]

Brown was the first woman examiner in piano for Western Canada.[8] In a 1953 interview with the Regina Leader-Post, she noted that between 30,000 and 35,000 student examinations—the majority of them in piano—were administered throughout the country annually. Adjusted by grade level, the piano examinations covered a range of categories, including "general style, rhythm, quality and variety of tone, technical ability and accuracy", as well as auditory and visual tests.[8]

Brown also adjudicated piano classes for various Canadian organizations, including the Windsor Music Festival in 1955,[5] the Lambton County Music Festival in 1959,[9] and summer courses for the Ontario Registered Music Teachers' Association in Stratford and Peterborough, Ontario, in 1962.[10]

Brown died in Owen Sound on February 15, 1970.[1]

• Piano Hand Book (1962) (with Mary MacKinnon Shore)[11]

• Margaret Miller Brown at Find a Grave