FEATURE - Music, mathematics and mountains
by Louise Tasker
John Taylor, who this August turned 93 years old, has had a long and varied history starting in New Zealand and ending up in Mooloolaba.
John Taylor is the well-known accompanist for the Mapleton Choir for whom he has been playing piano for 40 years.
He starts our chat off by telling me about a trip he was taking in LA in 1970 where he was fortunate to listen to Aaron Copland conducting the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra as they performed Copland’s suite Appalachian Spring, which had been written for the Martha Graham Dance Company.
John says, “Of itself this is not such an interesting anecdote but it is serendipitous that one of the songs the Choir is performing in October is Simple Gifts which is the basis of Appalachian Spring!”
I’m actually more impressed by his memory!
John was born in Wellington, New Zealand, on 16 August 1933. He and his sister
Rosemary and parents lived in a suburb near the top of the cable car terminal.
John’s father fought in WW1 and, although he came home very unwell, he studied accounting in the evening and became a government accountant. He was a self-taught pianist who passed his ability on to his son.
John’s mother was from a farming family. She became a nurse and went to Australia for work, travelling around the country, including taking a train to Perth, which was adventurous for the 1920s.
John started playing the piano when he was six years old. It became a life-long passion.
In 1959, after he attained his university degree in Music and Composition, John married an Australian, Barbara, whom he met in Wellington, in 1959 and so began his long relationship with Australia.
While John’s biggest passion has always been music, mathematics runs a close second.
Over several years he had various jobs involving either music or statistics. But he didn’t really enjoy his working life until an incredible opportunity arose.
“One day I was feeling frustrated and while I should have been working, I took Barb and her mother for a drive. We stopped and I used a telephone booth to call my boss, and I said I’m sorry I am not feeling well enough to come into work today. He said, well, I might be able to cheer you up. Come next January you are going to Canberra to study as a computer programmer!”
And in January 1965, John had a new job, a new city and he never looked back. It was fantastic, he tells me, a twinkle in his eye.
If you think it takes a while for John to commit to things, you would be wrong. When John reached his mid-40s, he started running to keep healthy. “You don’t want to go downhill any faster than you already are heading,” he laughs.
The running continued right up until three years ago.
John joined Parkrun because his daughter Melissa has been heavily involved in Parkrun for years; she set up the arduous Nambour route.John has run that route a number of times since he joined Parkrun in 2012.
In 2018, when he was 84, John became the oldest Parkrunner in the world to have 250 runs under his belt. When he was 88 years old, he became the oldest person in Australia to hold the record for 400 park runs. When he reached 90, he decided he was done with running.
He is still involved though – now he volunteers at Birtinya Island, sorting out the little tokens that people receive when they pass over the finish line. He has a good friend who picks him up early every Saturday morning, drops him at Birtinya by 6.30am, does her shopping and then returns to collect him. That is some dedication – from both of them!
He also has a tradition of climbing local mountains on his birthday, with his daughter. His last climb was in August 2025. He tells me he still might make it for his 94th.
And he is utterly committed to the Mapleton Choir. This year is a very special year for John.
In 1986, John joined as accompanist, and he has remained so as the Choir moved through several iterations to its present form based at Kureelpa and Dulong Community Hall. Playing for the Choir means “I’m enjoying music, not just listening to other people playing but actually doing it myself,” he tells me.
John’s favourite musical genre is classical. “My all-time favourite piece is the First Movement of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony. Music can fill you with all sorts of emotions, but nothing else I’ve ever heard fills my space with life like this piece does.”
John also frequently arranges pieces of music in four-part harmony to suit the Choir and writes musical compositions.
The River, which has been performed by the Mapleton Choir, is about the Maroochy River.
It engages the mind, asking the listener to think about what over-development means to river systems and the lives sustained in and around them.
He has also written Cymbeline (The Play by William Shakespeare) - Parts I and II: A Choral Paraphrase, which the Choir has performed.
Two things I’m interested to find out – what does John, once at the forefront of computer programming, think of AI. “I’m scared of it,” he admits. “I know very little about it but it seems to be suggesting that we are not the ones in control and it’s taking all the joy out of discovering things.”
I also want to know if John thinks life used to be easier, simpler, kinder. But he says, “I don’t think so. Everything is different to what it was, but I don’t look back and think things were better then than they are now.”
John says goodbye, hanging onto his trusty walking stick, named Fletcher.
What stamina he has – Parkrun for many years and the Choir for even longer. When next we feel we can’t be bothered, we could think about weekly commitments for 40 years.
That is what the Mapleton Choir receives from John, something they are immensely proud of and grateful for.
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