Jon Gingell in Wonder.land

Jon Gingell teaches guitar at Southampton as well as working for the National Theatre and in many other high-profile freelance roles.  He is a Southampton Music graduate.

I have been working as programmer and copyist at the National Theatre on the recent production of ‘Wonder.land’, a new musical based on Alice In Wonderland created by Rufus Norris, Moira Buffini and Damon Albarn. As well as programming the keyboards used in the show – which involved sampling Albarn’s hardware synths and instruments and recreating them as software instruments – the copying (or music prep) for the show has been a weighty task, with 37 numbers for 8 instrumentalists in an ever-evolving production until opening night.

As the show moves towards its cast recording and transfer to the Châtelet in Paris in the spring, further work has been involved in adding string parts to the re-arranged show, with sessions at Albarn’s 13 Studios and Angel Studios in Islington. I will also be going in as a dep guitarist during the run.

It is, as ever, an inspiration to work with such talented colleagues at the National in order to get the most out of the score. Where else can you hear the request “can you mark that phrase Subito Shostakovich, please”?