That’s a nice compliment, thx! I myself expected a little more growth overall. Especially the left side is rather thin/weak. The tree seems to be in good health though, which is the main thing.
I definitely plan to heavily cut back the upright, but only during dormancy, in order to maximize growth response. Does that sound right?
Miki, I’m sure pruning the vertical back this winter is fine. Next year, keep an eye on it and do repeated trimmings keeping it short. I have some pears too, agonizingly slow to fill out the first tier. I’ve decided to think of it more as developing a work of art in slow motion, an exterior bonsai experience.
Winter pruning time! Cut a couple of buds on the left to keep on stimulating growth. More on the right to keep it balanced. Only kept a few buds on the upright, to direct enough energy toward the laterals.
I’m hoping for some more vigor this season, now that the tree is a bit more established 
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Good growth progress! A question though: as one should in order to avoid strong upward growth, I pruned to downward facing buds for the horizontals this winter. You can see from the picture however that this last bud progresses as expected, but that the before-last (upward-facing) bud seems to be taking over with strong vertical growth. Should I do something to temper this?
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Use horticultural green tape to tie down your laterals as they extend. Cut back the unwanted verticals to the 3-5 leaf area (keep them there, pinching repeatedly throughout the season). Try to keep the center vertical around 4 inches, clean it up so it’s not competing with the horizontals.
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