I was brought up in New Zealand but studied the violin in Australia. After graduating I played professionally in an opera and ballet orchestra. When attending an Australian String Teachers conference I met the first American teacher to study with Suzuki in Japan, John Kendall, graduate of the Juillard School in New York. He offered me a scholarship to do a Masters in Performance and Teaching (Suzuki) in the USA that was a two-year course. We taught students who travelled, in some cases, five hours to attend groups and private lessons at the university. The programme had children from Twinkle to Tchaikovsky in it. It was a fabulous training which included teaching at summer workshops around America, national and international conferences. Whilst in the USA I was also fortunate to be coached in chamber music by the Beaux Art Trio which built on the coaching I had received from the Coull Quartet in Australia.


The first groups I taught in the UK were at the London Suzuki Group building in Bayswater where the children also had Kodaly classes with Yuko Vinden. Before long we outgrew the building and started using College Park School, also in Bayswater, which enabled me to start an orchestra programme. It is thrilling to see the cello programme grow and to work with colleagues who bring so much to performing and musicianship. We have now had our third annual chamber music course which extends every participant in their playing and musicianship skills.

Jillian holds a large annual concert each November with the other BSG teachers. At the end of the Easter and Summer she holds informal soloists concerts for each of her pupils - (an excellent evening always ending in a party held at pupils houses).