Day 40 - Right from the outset of this adventure, I have not made it a secret that I love to play the piano. As the team will confirm, I seem to be magnetic to pianos and, given the chance, will play them at every available opportunity. There have been some great pianos to play but a few where the last tuning was in the last century! (Ouch!)
To my surprise and delight, the team have not made it a secret that they enjoy my playing and generally welcome the opportunity to either listen or, as in Lincoln, to come along and sing worship songs and hymns. In addition, we sometimes do in a few classic popular songs for a 'Sing-along-with-Tim' session, with songs like 'Let It Be' by the Beatles or 'Rocket Man' by Elton John.
The team have seemed to use the term 'concert' when they would like me to play, which I was rather hesitant about initially as I generally do not see myself as a performer. My playing has mainly been limited to playing in church and that I would not want to be seen as a performance but more my chance to serve a congregation to worship and praise the Lord. However, in America, I am also playing pieces I have composed and released on albums, along with some pop songs, so to that degree it could be seen as a performance.
In Lincoln we were staying at a Catholic Centre which had a church/ sancturary where the general public could come and pray. Up on the balcony was a Yamaha Grand Piano and when I found it I was all alone in the church so started to play. To my shock, when I finished playing there were people in the church, including some from the team but I was playing songs appropriate for a place of worship.
As a result, I was asked to play on the Sunday Evening by the team to facilitate a worship time and the priest from the centre popped in too. Much to my surprise, there were not many songs that everyone knew. We rolled out classic hymns like Amazing Grace, When I Survey The Wonderous Cross and How Great Thou Art but then I started to teach them some of the songs I knew.
It was a great time but I was stunned that there seemed to be lack of awareness about short simple songs and that the Hymnal was still the main base for most churches in America. Given that most of the church songs I know eminated from the USA, I was suprised that most of the team did not know them. However, this music time together in Lincoln was not to be the only time we gathered together and this appreciation of my playing was to result in all the copies of my albums I packed to be sold and for some tracks to be downloaded from my website. (www.timbrucemusic.co.uk/store)
(I think that is what success looks like!!)