What is TAMTRI?
The Australian Music Theatre Research Institute (TAMTRI) was established by composer and writer Peter Wyllie Johnston in 2010. Peter is the current director of TAMTRI and provides research services in the fields of music and music theatre. TAMTRI's services are used for publications, specialist lectures, academic conferences and in the music theatre industry.
Current Projects — 2021-2022
Geoffrey Tozer: Pure Genius — the official biography of Australia's greatest pianist.
Geoffrey Tozer: Pure Genius — screenplay of the forthcoming documentary film, a scholarly portrayal of Tozer's life and career, as Australia's greatest pianist.
TAMARAMA — a new musical, with music and lyrics by Peter Wyllie Johnston, a story adapted from real-life events in Sydney in 2002.
Geoffrey Tozer: Pure Genius — screenplay of the forthcoming documentary film, a scholarly portrayal of Tozer's life and career, as Australia's greatest pianist.
TAMARAMA — a new musical, with music and lyrics by Peter Wyllie Johnston, a story adapted from real-life events in Sydney in 2002.
The Australian Musical — From the Beginning
The definitive history of the Australian musical (large format hardcover, 432 pages, 313 illustrations), by Peter Wyllie Johnston and Peter Pinne, was published on 5 November 2019 by Allen and Unwin, and is available for purchase online and in book stores throughout Australia.
Background: In 2011, Peter was appointed Honorary Associate Professor in the Faculty of the VCA and MCM at the University of Melbourne. Since then he has created and lectured 'Musical Theatre In Context', a course which analysed the development of musical theatre from 1900 to the present. In 2012 he conducted a major research symposium: Rodgers and Hammerstein - Understanding the Phenomenon, with international guests of honour Oscar Hammerstein III and Ted Chapin, Global President of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization. (See: Ted Chapin Travels To Melbourne). He has published Morag Beaton -- Her Life and Her Art (new edition, TBA 2019), The Nick Enright Songbook (Currency Press, 2014), and in 2015 he wrote the Foreword (1000 words) for The Craig Christie Songbook, published by Origin Theatrical, Sydney. Peter is also the author of From The Melburnian – Essays and Articles on the Broadway Musical, the Australian Musical, Opera and Classical Music (launched by Jeanne Pratt AC in September 2011)
His other writing credits include more than 200 articles and reviews on music published in academic journals and in The Australian, Sunday Age, The Melburnian, Opera Australasia, Soundscapes, OnStage, www.artshub.com and The Times (UK), and several short biographies of the great Australian pianist, Geoffrey Tozer.
Photograph Copyright © Geoffrey Tozer 2002
Copyright © Estate of Geoffrey Tozer 2009
Photograph Copyright © Geoffrey Tozer 2002
Copyright © Estate of Geoffrey Tozer 2009
Biography
Peter Wyllie Johnston is an Australian musician and writer.
Peter was born in Melbourne. He learnt the piano from the age of five and later studied singing and piano at the Canberra School of Music (1985-1987) and the Victorian College of the Arts (1988-1989) where his teachers were Dame Joan Hammond, Ronald Maconaghie and Alexander Semetsky. In 1989 Peter was elected a Full Composer Member of the Australasian Performing Right Association, having produced his first composition for the piano (A Waltz in E Minor) at the age of twelve. His musical, Moses — the Spirit of Freedom, has been produced in showcase productions and concerts in London, New York, the Barossa Valley in South Australia, and most recently in Melbourne, Australia by VOYCE, the youth wing of the Victorian Opera Company (two concerts of excerpts on May 12, 2019).
Peter was the additional book writer on Joanna White's new musical, Girl in Pink (2015), and has recently completed the music, lyrics, and book (with literary contributions by Trent O'Brien) of his new musical Tamarama.
Peter has sung in opera, musical theatre, and cabaret. He first sang boy soprano roles with the Australian Opera company appearing for several years, in operas including Turandot, Tannhouser, Tosca and Boris Gudonov. In 1988 and 1989 he sang (baritone chorus) with the Victoria State Opera. Since 1985 he has performed in piano bars and cabaret in New York, London, Washington DC, Honolulu, Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Adelaide, including the cabaret "Of Things Australian" (2000) which was produced for two seasons at The Firebird Café in Manhattan, "Fewster and King-Pioneers of the Australian Musical" at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival (2005) and "Kenneth Duffield-From Adelaide to the West End" also at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival (2007). In 2007, he presented a highly successful musical cabaret and lecture, "A Journey Through Australian Musicals" at the Victorian Arts Centre, as part of their Spotlight Lecture Series. In 2008, he devised and presented a comprehensive lecture series, "The Jewish Influence On Broadway", as part of the Florence Melton Programme (a project of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem).
Peter's PhD (2008) is entitled "Who's Playing Our Song? The Development of the Australian Musical 1900-2000". He was educated at the University of Melbourne (Bachelor of Laws 1982 and Doctor of Philosophy), La Trobe University (Bachelor of Arts and Diploma in Education), and the Australian National University (Master of Laws Pr. with First Class Honours 1988 for his thesis entitled "The Operation and Development of the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA)").
As the sole Executor of the Estate of the late virtuoso pianist Geoffrey Tozer, Peter is responsible for the substantial Tozer Archive (which houses more than 12,000 documents and 900 recordings of Tozer's Australian and international performances from 1963 to 2009).
Peter was born in Melbourne. He learnt the piano from the age of five and later studied singing and piano at the Canberra School of Music (1985-1987) and the Victorian College of the Arts (1988-1989) where his teachers were Dame Joan Hammond, Ronald Maconaghie and Alexander Semetsky. In 1989 Peter was elected a Full Composer Member of the Australasian Performing Right Association, having produced his first composition for the piano (A Waltz in E Minor) at the age of twelve. His musical, Moses — the Spirit of Freedom, has been produced in showcase productions and concerts in London, New York, the Barossa Valley in South Australia, and most recently in Melbourne, Australia by VOYCE, the youth wing of the Victorian Opera Company (two concerts of excerpts on May 12, 2019).
Peter was the additional book writer on Joanna White's new musical, Girl in Pink (2015), and has recently completed the music, lyrics, and book (with literary contributions by Trent O'Brien) of his new musical Tamarama.
Peter has sung in opera, musical theatre, and cabaret. He first sang boy soprano roles with the Australian Opera company appearing for several years, in operas including Turandot, Tannhouser, Tosca and Boris Gudonov. In 1988 and 1989 he sang (baritone chorus) with the Victoria State Opera. Since 1985 he has performed in piano bars and cabaret in New York, London, Washington DC, Honolulu, Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Adelaide, including the cabaret "Of Things Australian" (2000) which was produced for two seasons at The Firebird Café in Manhattan, "Fewster and King-Pioneers of the Australian Musical" at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival (2005) and "Kenneth Duffield-From Adelaide to the West End" also at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival (2007). In 2007, he presented a highly successful musical cabaret and lecture, "A Journey Through Australian Musicals" at the Victorian Arts Centre, as part of their Spotlight Lecture Series. In 2008, he devised and presented a comprehensive lecture series, "The Jewish Influence On Broadway", as part of the Florence Melton Programme (a project of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem).
Peter's PhD (2008) is entitled "Who's Playing Our Song? The Development of the Australian Musical 1900-2000". He was educated at the University of Melbourne (Bachelor of Laws 1982 and Doctor of Philosophy), La Trobe University (Bachelor of Arts and Diploma in Education), and the Australian National University (Master of Laws Pr. with First Class Honours 1988 for his thesis entitled "The Operation and Development of the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA)").
As the sole Executor of the Estate of the late virtuoso pianist Geoffrey Tozer, Peter is responsible for the substantial Tozer Archive (which houses more than 12,000 documents and 900 recordings of Tozer's Australian and international performances from 1963 to 2009).
TAMTRI Activities and Services
Publications
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Specialist Lectures
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The Musical Theatre Industry
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Academic Conferences
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