A Special Day with my Children & Music!
Yesterday was a really meaningful day for me. I had my two daughters with me from Friday night and all day Saturday, which normally means I wouldn’t take on a gig. But on Thursday I’d been asked to play a beautiful grand piano at a local bookshop, and I decided this time I’d just bring them along. They happily kept themselves entertained while I played background music for a couple of hours, a mix of songs people know and quite a bit of improvisation. The piano itself was a stunning Yamaha grand and it just felt great to sit there and play. But the most special moments were when my daughters came up and joined me. At one point my youngest came and sat beside me and started playing a couple of notes we’d explored together weeks ago a simple C and E together and other notes in C major. I don’t formally teach my daughters music. I prefer to let them learn through osmosis because that’s how they seem to enjoy it most. They’ll often just come and ask me to show them things when they’re curious. So she played those notes in her own improvised way while I played chords around her. It wasn’t a performance, it was just a natural musical moment that happened to be in a bookshop with people around. Later my older daughter came up and asked me to play a song I wrote for her. She’s learned the introduction and the melody, so she played that as an ostinato while I played and sang the piece. It was such a special, organic moment to share together. Afterwards I got to spend the rest of the day just being with them. So Saturday felt pretty perfect: time with my kids, making music for people, improvising freely on a beautiful piano, and sharing those little musical moments with my daughters.