Deborah Harris became passionate about teaching from a very early age, having been very frustrated by her own poor musical experiences of violin tuition at school.  It was not really until after she had left college and had further private tuition that she became satisfied with her own playing, having recognised first hand that teaching itself requires serious study and that indifferent teaching can cause years of difficulty.  Deborah was born in 1960 into an arts-loving family and started teaching in 1977  She studied violin at Trinity College of Music with Leonard Smith and piano with Valda Aveling, with whom she reached diploma standard in the first year.  

After gaining her degree and Licentiateship,  she undertook further study privately and freelanced for several years with various chamber groups and quartets.  She completed a post-graduate year at Goldsmiths’ College, University of London and dabbled with the idea of an academic career, applying and being accepted for a PhD but dropped out, feeling she needed to be more directly involved in the world somehow, though she was not sure how at the time.  

Dissatisfied with nothing but playing and reluctant to teach in schools because of the lack of provision for pupils within the system, Deborah instead decided to undertake a variety of work to gain skills in other areas of life, including concert management and festival organisation (Windsor Festival), exhibitions organisation (Ideal Home Exhibition), teacher training, probation service management (Inner London Probation Service) and computing.  Throughout, she continued energetically to teach and study violin and piano.   

In 1990-91, through her experiences in the probation service, she began to study psychoanalytic psychotherapy at the London Centre for Psychotherapy and had decided to train as a psychotherapist when Colourstrings appeared.  She dropped everything and has been a devotee of the method ever since, also recognising that the languages and other varied skills she had learnt and used up to that point could now come together to be of great benefit in one role.

After meeting with the Colourstrings originator, Dr Géza Szilvay, in 1992, Deborah spent many weeks studying with him and observing his teaching.  Together, they have worked on many major Colourstrings publications.  Deborah began working for The Szilvay Foundation in April 1992 and became a Director of Colourstrings International in October that year.   

 

Deborah’s first Colourstrings task was to write a handbook for Music Kindergarten Teachers and devise, teach and continuously develop Music Kindergarten Teacher Training Courses nationally.  She did this successfully, the first three courses running in 1993.  Since 1992, she has worked regularly with the Colourstrings/Colourkeys originators, helping develop materials and training, furthering the work of the Foundation and teaching on the International Summer Courses.  In 1998, she passed this latter work on to Karen Mackenzie.  Other projects have included preparing and recording children for the Colourstrings Singing and Rhythm Rascals tapes/CDs, drawing up the prototype for the violin teacher training programme, translating the teachers’ notes for Violin Books A and B and most recently, the translation of the Violin Teachers’ and Parents’ Handbook with Géza for Books ABCD (2005).

  

In 1994-97, she set up and taught the Colourstrings project at the Blackheath Conservatoire, SE3 and jointly set up the Colourstrings Saturday School with Pat Wislocki where she taught for 6 years. Several of her students there were accepted by Ester Boda Katona at the Royal College of Music, who reported that they had been ‘very well taught’.

 

In order both to further Colourstrings and be able to continue to pay her mortgage, Deborah set up her own Colourstrings School in January 1995 offering Music Kindergarten and Instrumental tuition.  She has given various solo violin recitals in London and aims to play seriously again in the near future.   Deborah was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2004 in recognition of her achievements and her contribution to arts and the community.  She is married with two children and three step-children and has a strong interest in languages, education, psychology, philosophy and current affairs.  

Deborah Harris

North London Colourstrings - helping children successfully learn music since 1995