I had always enjoyed playing piano growing up and was half-way decent, but also (kind of) knew I wasn’t going to be a professional. Not least because a piano teacher had the gall to tell me in 10th grade “you’ve got a great ear, but you started technique too late and will never be a professional.” Classy lady. My WISE project was therefore a chance to maybe prove her wrong, but more honestly to do something that I knew I probably wouldn’t have the time to do again. So the spring of 1989 was spent taking music theory and doing a lot of piano practicing to learn all three movements of Beethoven’s Sonata Pathetique. To this day it remains the longest, most complex piece of music I ever learned and while it’s been a long time since I ever played it in it’s entirety, it’s great to know that I could.

After high school I went on to get a degree in biochemistry, worked in cancer research for a few years then went on to get post-graduate degrees in business and biochemical engineering. I now run an energy company, and any dreams of being a professional musician are long behind me. But I’ve kept playing, if only in my free time. And occasionally in a bar band. My repertoire of late is more three-chords-and-the-truth than three movements, but I still credit WISE with giving me the musical self-confidence to keep at it, if only for a bit of fun. (The picture of me is from a recent gig, doing a bit of Elton John…)