Music and deafness

Paul Whittaker OBE tells Clare Stevens how he surmounted the challenges of being a deaf musician and how he has spent his career trying to create more musical opportunities for hearing impaired people of all ages

Above: Clare Stevens Photo: Bruce Childs

Left : Paul Whittaker OBE Photo: PBGstudios The word ‘allegedly’ crops up a lot in the motivational talks given by Paul Whittaker OBE to business gatherings, education conferences or community organisations. Addressing the elephant in the room almost immediately, he admits that most people who read his biography or hear him speak very clearly and fluently wonder how he can describe himself as a deaf musician. Surely that is a contradiction in terms?

In response, Whittaker explains that he most certainly is profoundly deaf, and has been all his life, as a result of premature birth and jaundice. But as a child growing up in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, his musical instinct was apparent from an early age and he was keen to learn to play the piano. Bemused as to how they might teach a child who could not hear what he was playing or what they were telling him, most turned him down. But eventually his family found someone who was prepared to teach him.

‘My understanding of music is based entirely on what I see on the score; it was a case of me saying “well, show me what you want me to do, and I’ll watch you and copy it”,’ he explains. ‘So you could argue that from a very young age I’ve been working with teachers, helping them how to work out how to teach pupils who are deaf.’

From the age of seven he sang in his local church choir, absorbing musical theory and learning to sightread by osmosis while having fun making music with friends. His primary school did not know how to support deaf pupils, but his musicianship was encouraged by inspiring teachers Duncan Saint at his middle school and then Hedley Teale at Belle Vue School in Bradford. Whittaker played in the school wind band and regularly played the piano for school assemblies.

By this stage he also played the organ, an instrument that is more difficult for a deaf person, he explains, because of the variations between one instrument and another and the distance between the sound source and what comes back to the performer. On a piano, by contrast, he can sound a note and feel the vibrations travelling up his arm, enabling him to articulate it expressively.

Persuading the school to let him include music in his O-level choices proved to be a challenge, and Whittaker was rejected by 12 universities on the grounds that a deaf person couldn’t possibly do a music degree, before winning the only available place that year at Wadham College, Oxford. ‘Oxford really looked at my ability rather than my disability – as far as they were concerned, I could read music and I could talk about music, and that was enough for them. Both the college and the music department were incredibly helpful and supportive. I was appointed as the college organist; and as the only undergraduate music student in my year in Wadham I had to learn how to talk to and get on with other people in my college who were studying different subjects. I really came out of my shell.’

Studying for a postgraduate diploma at the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM) proved to be a less satisfactory experience. Whereas at Oxford his tutors and examiners had been happy to judge a short dissertation on music and deafness on its merits as a piece of research and writing, accepting that they did not have the expertise to assess the content, at the RNCM Whittaker had bruising encounters with examiners who did not understand the issues he was describing. His negative experiences strengthened his resolve to try to change things for succeeding generations of deaf and hearing-impaired students.

An early campaign was to try to get exam boards to find new yardsticks for assessing the musicality of deaf candidates that were more appropriate than conventional aural tests which they cannot possibly pass. ‘It is intrinsically wrong when you are given a certificate marked, “did not complete the course”, which is essentially what happens. You want the same qualification, the same achievement, as everybody else, no matter what sort of disability you have, you don’t want it watered down and made easier. They need to find other ways of sorting that out.’

After graduating from the RNCM Whittaker spent some time working independently, contacting schools that had deaf pupils and offering to run music activities for them. ‘When deaf children attend a

Above (from left): Paul Whittaker signing Bach Choir concert Photo: Stephen Heselton Paul Whittaker working with musicians concert or participate in a workshop they discover – hopefully – a whole new world of emotion, colour and excitement. When they try playing or feeling different instruments they find something that can become an extension of themselves and a medium for selfexpression, thus beginning a lifelong musical journey.’

Eventually the opportunity arose for Whittaker to fulfil his longheld dream and set up a charity to focus on this sort of work, not just in schools but in the wider community. The result was Music and the Deaf (MatD), which he ran for 27 years. During that time, he says, the charity’s achievements included making a huge number of people in the arts world and the education sector aware that deaf people can enjoy music and can be musicians.

‘I’m proud of the way we changed attitudes and perceptions towards music and deafness, which is an incredibly difficult thing to do; we created resources including a guide to making music all the way through from Reception to Key Stage 4; and we offered advice and support which people found immensely valuable.’

Seven years ago Whittaker left MatD, keen to have a more flexible schedule and explore other avenues. These include his hugely successful motivational speeches, which he delivers with the confidence and razor-sharp timing of a stand-up comedian.

‘If you’d said to me when I was young, you’re going to stand up in front of 2,500 people and entertain them I would have said no, I’m shy, I don’t do things like that,’ he admits. ‘Now I’m different, I love having an audience. Partly it’s my enthusiasm to share my experience of deafness and music and spread a bit of deaf awareness. The incidence of hearing loss is about one in five, getting nearer to one in four in the elderly community, so in talking about it, perhaps I may help someone to communicate with their aging parents.’

Another important part of Whittaker’s work is giving signed performances of opera, music theatre and concerts. ‘Orchestras and concert halls need to recognise that they have to work much harder to keep their audiences, especially their older audiences, an increasing proportion of whom may be hearing impaired, so they need to find ways of improving access for them. This could be 25% of their audience. If they can change their mindsets, they will be able to help retain those people.’

In 2010, he gave the first ever signed BBC Prom – Sondheim at 80 – with performers such as Judi Dench and Bryn Terfel. Pre-pandemic he visited 13 countries with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra on their ‘Feel The Music’ project. Passionate about signed song, in 2017 he set up SiBSL – Songs in British Sign Language (BSL), a website dedicated to raising standards and awareness of the art form. He runs four signing choirs in the North of England, plus two online; is currently working on projects with the National Youth Choir of Scotland; and recently gave a signed performance of Schubert’s song cycle Winterreise, in Leeds, with mezzo-soprano Katherine Broderick and pianist Katherine Stott. When we spoke – coincidentally in Sign Language Week – he was excitedly looking forward to making his debut with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, signing their performance of Bach’s St John Passion.

Whittaker has strong opinions on issues to do with inclusivity, which he is not afraid to express. He is cynical, for example, about ‘the Rose effect’: the success of deaf actor Rose Ayling-Ellis in last year’s Strictly Come Dancing. ‘Historically, deaf people have always enjoyed dancing, because they can feel the vibrations on a sprung floor. You don’t need to be able to hear music to dance, what you need is to be able to count a sequence. Yes, lots of people enrolled in sign language courses as a result of seeing those involved in the show communicating with Rose, but how long will they keep it up?’

He is critical of some aspects of the British Sign Language Act currently passing through parliament, explaining that a similar act in Scotland which became law a decade ago has actually diminished the number of deaf people in work, because encouraging hearing people to learn to sign means they are taking jobs and roles that should be given to deaf people. ‘For instance, at this year’s BAFTAs where Aled Jones’s daughter

sang a song with a BSL signer … so what? If the BAFTAs really wanted to make an impact they should have had a deaf singer and a deaf BSL signer on the show, not a hearing person.’

Not only that, he adds, but ‘it’s very important to me that whoever they get to interpret these events should be musical. If they can also be a deaf person, so much the better, because that’s a role model for a deaf child. Lots of hearing musicians do fantastic work with deaf people, but they will never, ever be the same as a deaf person doing that work. In the past two years or so there’s been a lot of awareness of cultural appropriation, and that’s a factor in our sector too.’

Are there more deaf musicians now equipped to interpret concerts than when he started?

‘The number of deaf young musicians is growing all the time – nobody’s got any figures –they are around, but it’s still difficult for them to break into the actual music world.’

He is concerned about the impact of COVID-19 on the deaf community, especially children in schools where the requirement to wear masks meant they were unable to lip-read. More fundamentally, he believes the move in recent decades to integrate young people with disabilities within mainstream education has actually done them a disservice, because they can feel so isolated and never meet anyone like them.

And he is a passionate advocate for older musicians in both professional and amateur environments who may be losing their hearing. ‘They have had decades of experience, they know the pieces inside out, they can follow a conductor, they can still hold a line – why should they lose their jobs or be forced to leave the choirs they love? You may have to find ways of getting round communication, you might have to change where they sit, but they shouldn’t be excluded.’

Does he have a final message for ISM members?

‘I would encourage them and all musicians to be open and honest about any hearing difficulties they have. Be honest, be open, be encouraging, be able to explore and remember that there is someone here who can help you if you need it!’

Thanks to Paul Whittaker’s interpreter Stephen Heselton for facilitating this interview

Resources paulwhittaker.org Songs in British Sign Language sibsl.co.uk British Deaf Association bda.org.uk signlanguageweek.org.uk Music and the Deaf matd.org.uk

Below left: Lloyd Coleman performing with YolanDa Brown

Below right: Lloyd Coleman on stage with Paraorchestra Photo: Paul Blakemore

Role model: Lloyd Coleman Another role model with hearing impairment is composer, clarinettist and broadcaster Lloyd Coleman. Coleman, Associate Music Director of Paraorchestra since 2017, has lived with visual and hearing impairment since birth. In his teens he studied at Chetham’s School of Music and was a member of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, before moving to the Royal Academy of Music in London to study composition and the clarinet. He says he is fascinated by the human ability to adapt and thrive, regardless of any person’s disability. His work with Paraorchestra, the world’s only large-scale virtuoso ensemble of professional disabled and non-disabled musicians, embraces an orchestral reimagining of Kraftwerk in nightclubs; ‘exploding’ a 50-piece ensemble playing across a wide space, allowing audiences to create their own sonic adventures as they wander freely amongst the players; and headlining at Glastonbury’s Park Stage. lloydcoleman.net