Welcome to my April 2023 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (My life in first drafts), but this year, instead of pretending there were ever plans, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, G is for Gladys Angley, my piano teacher.

I started piano lessons when I was 5. My teacher for many years was Gladys Angley. I didn’t know anything about her, Miss Angley, except the bits and pieces I learned over the years. She had taken care of her parents, as single women often did back in the day, and never married. She had a brother. She had arthritis so bad, her hands were twisted. She was very patient although there were times I know I wore that patience pretty thin especially when I wanted to play with the various ornaments and things she had in her studio rather than play the pieces I was supposed to.

At some point, she gave up the studio she had at the Conservatory and began teaching out of her home. Her piano was set up in her living room and I would come in the front door, and walk past the stairs going up to the second floor, into the kitchen, and around into a room that was probably a dining room at some point but was now set up as a waiting room. I remember there being a lot of stuff in the rooms, chairs and couches and books and just stuff. I would wait until she was finished with the previous lesson, then go in and start mine.

Miss Angley taught at home because she wasn’t able to get around any more. But teaching had become her life. Eventually I stopped taking lessons, but she kept teaching even when she had to leave her house and go into a care facility. She still had some students come in. When the day came that she couldn’t teach any more, she passed away.

Years later I tried to find her house where I had taken lessons, but I couldn’t remember which one it was. I don’t know if it is still standing or if it has gone the way of so many other old houses to make way for progress.

I don’t play piano any more, but we do have mom and dad’s piano in our house, so maybe someday I’ll sit down and listen for Miss Angley’s voice telling me to curve my fingers on the keys.

I said earlier I didn’t know much about her, but I googled her today and found this…I wish I had taken the time to talk to her more about her life and to hear her story. She was one of those people who have an influence on your life, but you forget that they also had a life with people who influenced them.

——

ANGLEY, GLADYS B. (1912-1989)
Educator

Gladys Bethel Angley was born in Radisson, Saskatchewan in 1912 and moved to Regina in 1916 when her father, Frank B. Angley, became manager of Regina Pharmacy.   She received her early academic and musical training at Model School, Central Collegiate, Qu’Appelle Diocesan Girls’ School and at Regina College.  She studied piano with Sister Agnes, S.S.J.D., William M. Buckley and Dr. Lyle Gustin, theory with George Coutts, and Fred Killmaster and vocals with W. Francis.  Gladys received an Associate degree from the Toronto Conservatory of Music in 1931 and a Licentiate diploma from the Royal Schools of Music in London England in 1932.

She began teaching piano in public schools from 1931 to 1933, and taught piano in the Qu’Appelle Diocesan from 1933 to 1941, the Regina Conservatory of Music from 1941 to 1958 and the University of Regina from 1958 to 1980 when complications, due to rheumatoid arthritis in 1955, began to hinder her public performances.

Public performances between 1931 and 1956 included solo recitals, performing as a guest artist and as an ensemble member of the Buckley Piano Quartet.  By local radio Angley entertained listeners on the Prairie Network and the Canadian Broadcasting System, know now as the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (C.B.C.)

Thanks for visiting my 2023 A to Z Challenge – Letter G.  You can find links to more blogs participating in this challenge at Letter A, A to Z 2023 Challenge Master List (Google Docs).

Guess I’m kind of a rebel too…although I do like using the “official” letters…