john maver born 1932 is an australian pianist and composermaver was born in sydney where he studied the piano first under miss purcell of botany bay then with kathleen horne and ramsay pennycuick as a student of the nsw conservatorium of music he studied piano with the noted pianistcomposer frank hutchens a pupil of tobias matthay and composition with raymond hanson in sydney he performed on radio 2ch gave recitals and taught before sailing for london in 1968since then he has given a wide range of concerts including the wimbledon summer festival leighton house and a muchpublicised 1981 royal wedding day concert at st martinwithinludgatehe is one of the very few composerpianists on the circuit today in addition to a wide repertoire of neoclassical music and virtuoso romantic music he has established a considerable reputation with the performances of his own compositions as well as his own poetry albion enigma and he has presented concerts of extemporised keyboard workhe has worked with ballet rambert the royal ballet arts educational schools and the mime artists adam darius and nathaniel he was also musical director of the international arts centreparticipating in an american production pantomime of hansel and gretelmaver returned to australia for two years sojourn where he continued to give recitals most notably for the polishaustralian cultural society which was filmed and performances at the sydney opera house with the australian ballet and the english dancer maina gielgud for a television film frozen music he also appeared in the sydney spectacular for the australian broadcasting commission at the same time he made himself known as an actorappearing in tv series commercials and feature filmschief among which have been bodyline the last bastion playing opposite timothy west land of hope and burke and willsin the role of conductor an operatic sequence with greta scacchireturning to britain in 1986 maver resumed his career with a performance of his toccata australis a substantial work which has been well praised by many international pianists including vladimir horowitz nelson friere and shura cherkassky this work was first performed in britain by alan brown the american virtuoso pianist janice weber has praised several of mavers compositions as very horowitzian an tude for the left hand alone as very effective sounds as difficult as it is he has recorded a programme of bach beethoven chopin and franz liszt in addition to his own compositions and extemporisationsan unpublished novel has been completed he has established himself as a photographer in the casual style and has exhibited a collection of photos charting the rebuilding of part of the arts educational schools theatre in chiswick recently a london photo agency has accepted some of his photographic work to be included in their catalogue photographs have featured in the local press musical theatre pantomime programmes spotlight cd record covers and the kyoto gardens exhibition portfoliohe is related to sir harry lauder the scots baritone music hall singer and composer