City of Armadale - History House > Records

BATON

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c. 1950

Overview

A white plastic baton tapering towards the point, the thickest end has a cork handle attached, pitted and worn.

Historical information

John Christmass purchased the baton at Theo's Music in Stirling Street in Perth more than fifty years ago. It was initially used to conduct music and choirs, but John ended up just using his hands for the choirs due to the size of the baton.
John Christmass moved to the Kelmscott area in the 1970s. John had taught music since the 1940s and later joined the Department of Education and was in charge of their choral music program.
In 1985 he retired from the education department and focussed his time on teaching and promoting music from his Kelmscott office. From there he managed the I Voci Choir which was made up of past students from Perth Modern School aged 18-30.
John was the musical director for the Perth Anzac Day Services from 1971 to the early 2000s, he started the 1st Vienna Pops concert and the Best of British concert at the Perth Concert Hall in c1987 and 1991 respectively to help raise money for Rotary. He directed his last in 2013 and 2012. He was presented with the Order of Australia in 2012, for his services to music, plus many other local and state awards over the years.
Locally he directed many concerts, taught music, advocated for a concert venue in the City of Armadale and was a strong advocate for the local art and culture scene.
The award provides a connection to the long and distinguished career of John Christmass who has played an important role in music education as well as promoting music and choral music in Western Australia. John has also managed to raise many hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity.

Details

Registration number

cwa-org-33-COA2016.77

Item type

Musical instruments

Themes

People
Social History

Width

17 mm

Height or length

503 mm

Keywords

John Christmass

STIRLING Street Perth

Theo's Music

Year

c. 1950

Statement of significance

This object is part of a collection of items that tells the story of the creativity and ingenuity of members of the local community in relation to art, design and engineering/construction. The collection relates to expressions of creativity that impacted an individual or small group of people to objects that have been enjoyed around the world.

Comparative significance criteria

Interpretive capacity

Rare or representative

Well provenanced

City of Armadale - History House

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