2024 Winner: International Alumnus Award (Arts, Education and Law)
Master of Music Studies, Class of 2005
Cory Hills is a Grammy Award-winning percussionist and children’s storyteller committed to equitable arts education. Cory has opened the world of classical music to children across the world and has performed his Percussive Storytelling program over 1,200 times to more than 250,000 children in 10 countries.
What motivates you to continue striving for excellence in your field?
The kids. My work exists for these kids. It brings me immense joy and personal satisfaction to be able to provide quality arts programming to children who otherwise would not receive it. In addition, these children live in abject poverty. Many of the parents are migrant farm workers in Southern California. Some are illegal immigrants. Some are migrants sent to the area from the Texas border. I cannot house, feed, or support each of these children. However, I can, for one hour a day, bring their minds on a creative journey away from the stress of their everyday lives.
How do you see your industry evolving in the next decade, and how do you plan to adapt?
I love this question. I believe strongly that community arts engagement is in the process of exploding in the United States. All kinds of arts organisations are being pressured into finding new audiences and expanding their reach. While the pressure comes from a financial source, I couldn’t care less. As long as the community becomes the focus, I am happy. For me, on an individual level, I focus on children aged 4-11, more or less. But these other organisations can focus on so much more: teenagers, toddlers, and the elderly. Music therapy is growing at a rapid rate in the United States partly because of the rapidly growing senior population. This presents so many amazing opportunities for artists and organisations to bring their form of art to an extremely diverse audience.
As a funny aside, if I never played in a concert hall again, I would be as happy as my dog! And trust me, my dog is happy. Also, and I am just throwing this out there, but I would LOVE to meet and collaborate with the creators of Bluey. Griffith University, work your magic!
Can you share a piece of advice you wish you had received earlier in your career?
Develop a secondary skill. I don’t care what field you go into, have a secondary skill that you can develop. For me, it was writing. I always liked to write. Well, it turns out that when you become a freelancer away from the safety of universities and other institutions, you must do a lot of writing! Grant applications, fellowship awards, general prose, website material, bios, resumes, EMAILS. The list goes on and on. I would not have survived being a freelancer had it not been for my writing ability.
What does a typical day/week at work look like for you?
As a professional freelance musician, my work schedule can be absolutely nutty to say the least. But, in the past few years, I have settled into more of a set routine with my program, Percussive Storytelling. I have partnered with the City of Oxnard public schools in California to be an artist in their after-school programs. These programs were created after Covid when it was discovered that the Covid Learning Gap was more substantial than previously thought, especially among low-income, Hispanic populations. I go to one of the 17 primary schools in Oxnard to bring Percussive Storytelling to the students each week. Together we play instruments, write stories, compose music, dance, laugh, and make a whole bunch of noise.
How do you spend your downtime?
What is this downtime you speak of? Just kidding. With my family! And dogs. And chickens. I enjoy hiking, gardening, and birding. Yes, birding. It’s real thing!
Why did you choose Griffith University?
This is an easy question. One person: Professor Vanessa Tomlinson. I came to Griffith in 2004 in order to study with Professor Tomlinson in the percussion department at Queensland Conservatorium. Professor Tomlinson was an internationally known performer, specialising in theatrical percussion, an area I had a great deal of interest in. I basically came sight unseen, trusting my gut and taking a huge risk. It turned out to be one the best decisions I ever made. Vanessa is, and will be, the most important mentor in my life.
How did your time at Griffith help shape your career?
I don’t know what kind of career I would have if I hadn’t come to Griffith to study with Vanessa. I came to Australia as solid percussionist with fast hands and a hunger to do more. I left Australia as an artist with the tools necessary to connect my imaginative, creative brain with my hands to realise crazy projects. In addition to all this, I learned a lot about being a professional, advocating for myself, and the benefits that come from living abroad. My world-view expanded exponentially, and I never turned back. In fact, while in Australia, I was invited to spend a year in Italy at Institute Fabrica, working on contemporary arts exploration. And there, I wrote the first percussive story called The Lost Bicycle.
What inspired you to pursue your current career path?
My career path through Percussive Storytelling was inspired by my work and study with Professor Tomlinson. While I did not create any children’s stories in Australia, I did a ton of theatrical work. I performed many pieces that required speaking, movement, choreography, and more. All this work, research, and study culminated in me kind of ditching it altogether. It’s true. I remember a moment in Italy when I became jaded and upset at this experimental music that I clearly had mastered but nobody else appreciated (yes, I was young and naïve!).
So, in an act I can only describe as one-half inspiration and one-half perspiration, I wrote "The Lost Bicycle" as a response to my dismay at contemporary art audiences. Later, I found that the issue was not with the audience; rather, it was with myself. I simply hadn’t found my artistic voice and was trying to put a square peg in a round hole. Once I discovered this, I was off to the races with Percussive Storytelling!
Can you share a valuable lesson you learned from a setback or failure in your career?
I don’t know about one specific example, but I can say that Percussive Storytelling, and me as a professional, developed through a series of mistakes. We all make them. The question is, "How are we going to learn from them?" Will we take the data learned from the mistakes and apply them to future work? My first summer doing Percussive Storytelling I did 123 shows. After each show, I wrote down what DID NOT work. I employed the scientific method, made incremental changes, and built a stronger program that is constantly in flux. This might seem like an over-attention to detail, and it might be, but I believe the answers lie behind the mistakes.
How do you approach leadership in your work and community involvement?
I try to not get involved in the leadership side of things. I have found that things can get a bit too messy at the top. I prefer to be a task-oriented person. A couple of years ago, after Percussive Storytelling received some national recognition, I was offered a full-time job as a thought-leader in children’s arts. At first this seemed amazing. But then I researched some and found that these thought-leaders were typically white men who were disconnected from the actual work being done. I simply love being directly involved in my community too much. I love nothing more than being in the trenches of creativity with children.
Favourite inspirational quote, and why?
“Begin anywhere.” – John Cage
I am not a fan of rules. I do not like the status quo. Instead, I like to tackle problems in different, often counterintuitive ways. John Cage summed this up perfectly. Begin anywhere!
Best life book recommendation, and why?
Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu. Taoism greatly influenced me as a human being in my 20s. I highly recommend the Ursula Le Guin translation.
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