Nostalgic Coffee Date about Working as a Pianist and Social Media without Sound

Today is a day for a coffee date. It is going to be nostalgic and we will talk about music. So if you are up to it, get yourself a tea or coffee and let’s chat, at least virtually. I wanted to get started by saying that I asked you on Instagram if you would like to see more stories in which I improvise piano. And, believe it or not, 100% (!) of you hit the “yes” button, wow. I have to say, I was surprised to say the least. For that reason I created the highlight on Instagram in which you can simply listen to me playing piano. Let me back this up a little. You need to know that I enrolled in the music conservatory in Dresden Carl Maria von Weber Musikhochschule for jazz piano. I only studied it for one semester, but it did open the door to working as a pianist. Especially working in the mall Altmarktgalerie Dresden secured me many more jobs as a musician. The grand piano was located on the same floor with all the cafés and was reached right at the end of the moving stairs. I would play on Friday and Saturday for a few hours and was approached by countless shoppers.

Me in the mall Altmarktgalerie in Dresden right in front of the grand piano on which I played on weekends in 2006

(Photo by Elisabeth Schermuly)

Usually I would do background music, so whenever people were eating or talking. In total I worked for five years as a pianist. Either alone or with other musicians. I vividly recall playing in a “band” during a wedding and we hadn’t even rehearsed together. That is the beauty of jazz, as long as you play the jazz standards everybody knows, you can play as a band even if you have never played with the other musicians before. However, somebody asked us for our band name and I just recall one person shouting something unintelligible and this is how we got out of it. Believe you me, I love to improvise, I am not that good at reading sheet music. To the present day I prefer listening to a song and then trying to figure out how to play it on the piano rather than having to read sheet music. I have played with many different musicians, but the one I played with the most was the guitarist Stefan Gröll, he is still an active musician in Görlitz. He was also much better in aquiring new clients and getting us gigs. However, I have to say, working what you are passionate about has its downsides. You will be forced to play what clients want. Your art is going to be commercialized. I didn’t like that at all. So I took the really though decision to change music to a hobby and work in another profession. I have been working in international HR for 12 years now. To be more specific, I work in Global Mobility and take care of expats. This has nothing to do with music.

The musician Stefan Gröll and me while working in 2008 (photographer is unkown)

I am often asked how I manage to work in a completely different area. My HR job is not creative at all, there is no music involved. I definitely have to say I could not do without creativity in my free time. This may be baking, this may be photography, this may be this blog. If I didn’t have a creative outlet after work, I would not survive. But it may come as a surprise, it took my quite a long time to get back to the piano. I barely played for a long time, I was just so tired of the same songs and the same requests. But 20 years later I suddenly got the urge to play again. Mainly at home, just to unwind and after work, but at least playing more regularly again. At some point I decided to record me while I was playing and when I uploaded this story to Instagram, I was surprised how many reactions I got. Really? I think I am probably the only one who turns off any sounds when watching stories on Insta. I only turn it on if it is really important, but if I can, I watch stories in silence, regardless if I am in a busy environment or alone at home. For me all the constant changes of music, sounds, voices is just something I would rather avoid. I prefer silence. Am I the weirdo or do you do it, too?

I will end this coffee date by presenting you the Youtube video with my popular brownie cookies; reason I am mentioning it here is that you hear me play an original composition in the back.