Category Archives: Piano

Football , What’s that Then?

Apparently there was a football match on Sunday night. Well I do declare.

The pollen is relentless. Trump got shot, but he survives.
A lucky man you would think. Another day is dawned indeed. Much chat about Trump and people thinking it was a publicity stunt. In truth some aspects of the shooting do seem odd. You would expect way more blood as your ear is full of blood vessels, it seemed to take a while for the bodyguards to get too him and normally he would have just been lifted and carried. If you or I had just been shot in the ear I suspect we would not be making a defiant gesture. But maybe I am just a looney…. Quite seriously a lot my US facebook mates are very worried about Trump now. I think he is guaranteed to win now and that may well have serious repercussions all around the world. The world is now becoming a very unstable place again geopolitically.

I can’t get started today at all. And yes as I type this it’s raining a lot again. Its also St Swithins day so 40 days of rain expected then.



Mental Health Days

Yep, it’s a bit rocky again out of the blue. There’s a surprise. Not. I was reading an article about bullying and it reminded me of a lot of things.if you survive if, it’s difficult not to become that thing yourself when you misguidedly think your just trying to protect yourself. And I get triggered easily. I can often control it for a while. Months maybe then some random event sets me off, like an encounter with a footpad jumping from the shadows.

I make music for myself but also for people I will never meet most of the time. Maybe they get the best part of the deal as they can imagine me as a far better person than I actually am with out the stress of having to interact with me face to face. I get feedback from them and unlike me, my music travels around a lot of the english speaking world and also beyond it at times. It’s something that I may well still be able to do if I live past the point where I can comfortably stagger out to gigs if I dont go totally gaga. It makes me happier then I would be if I didn’t do it, so I have a bit of a sense of purpose to life. I suppose if I had actually got anywhere near the conventional idea of success I would have have been really insufferable, though I maybe in any case 🙂

I do keep a diary of my mood and what I do during the day too as it helps me keep a bit of a grip on things. its most useful when my mood is very low and I have routines to keep going when i have zero motivation to do anything at all. I do run the risk of staring into space if I am not careful when I am in that zone.

I wish I had the energy to start a band to do some of my own original music in a live format, but I just don’t have the energy to organise it now.

Getting out of bed and recording at home is nothing like having to:
#1 Convince people to play the music you write
#2 Find people that actually have the time and ability to do it
#3 Organise rehearsals at places that everybody can actually get to
#4 Convince people to play what you actually want them to play (not turning say a piano ballad into a blues tune because the song has too many chords)
#5 people that are good but only want to play in a very restricted and limited style, for example will play rock but not if it drifts in to say world music or jazz influence

The list could go to about a #100 but you get my drift. Also need to be local….
It’s the managing to make it possible rather than the playing that is the hard part.

What Am I Like, You Really Don’t Want To Know.

Yep, my mind is a mixture of quite disturbing thoughts at times. Well it is at the time of writing. My goodness there goes another one. I am all a flutter. Gadzooks. I have been working a lot of trying to improve my fitness post Covid and lockdown and all that jazz. I think its working but I have equally well been getting more and more irritable and impatient to. My life is very quiet compared to how things were 5 years ago when I was still playing regular gigs and a lot of other stuff was also occupying my time too. Now I have time to think. Thinking can lead one to dangerous places which is why perhaps so many people on Facebook, X and so forth don’t even bother to attempt it?

A friend said I seemed irritable. Well lately I think I often am. Mostly with the universe in general. I am quite a full on sort of person when I get going. I can be a bit fiery. Perhaps I am a dragon…I also have to remember not to interject oaths and swearing in my conversations. I am constantly twitchy and tend to fidget. If I were giving a lecture I would be pacing from side to side rather than standing at the podium I think.

Here is a new song. Piano and Vocals. The latest keyboard I have has a really decent piano samples on it that make for a little more subtly that is very apparent on recordings.

Never Again As Friends

When I was younger and very naive I thought I would never understand why people would start to lean on alcohol and drugs as a crutch. Well I think I have it figured out now. I feel I have built a wall between me and the rest of the world. Partly for protection and partly due to just feeling other. I really don’t know what I can do about that now. Passing time has made me cynical too. If I do last a little while longer, I need to make a change or two so that my mind survives in good order even if my body does not.