John Lennon Piano Lesson

John Lennon Piano Lesson

When I was a child I studied the piano for an hour a day for six years.  I was a very thin child and had a frizzy permanent hair style done up by electric curlers and chemicals in a student salon.  I performed for the relatives when they came to visit.

The piano was beautiful with many curves and curliques and it was my responsibility to dust and polish it.  I had a piano bench that opened and my sheet music was kept inside.

I started playing when I was six years old, taking lessons from a woman who lived a couple of blocks away.  I loved the long walk to her mysterious house past large yards with fruit trees growing in them.  I was her youngest student and could not comprehend chords and chord progressions, but I was good at reading the notes.

Eventually , when I was about eight years old, I was asked to perform “Fur Elise”  with an adult orchestra at the Hotel Biltmore in Los Angeles.   I was the proverbial child in a pinafore dress being highlighted during the middle of the orchestra’s performance.  As I began to play, my consciousness shot out of my body and lingered on the ceiling.  I was amazed  that my fingers kept playing as they should.  I figured that that is the benefit of practicing a lot.  As my part ended and the orchestra started back up I slipped back into my body and never thought of the incident again until I was in my early twenties and heard of astral travel.  H-m-m-m,  I wonder if that is what happened to me.

After awhile I became resentful that I always had to practice while I heard the other children playing outside.  When I was eleven, I had asked my Mother if I could play modern music (folk music and pop songs).  She said no.  I got mad and told her to get rid of the piano.  And so she did because she thought another was going to be given to us by a relative, which didn't happen. So sad.

Fast forward to my mid twenties and I had another piano.  This was an old high boxy piano that I had painted pictures on.  One night John Lennon and Harry Nilsson came to my house and I played piano with them sitting on each side of me.  I called it my John Lennon piano lesson as it seemed he was showing me how to loosen it up and tinkle on the keys a little more.  I was playing “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling.” 

The next day May Pang called me on the phone and we talked about piano lessons.  After that John’s tour manager came to visit and wanted me to travel to South America with him, which I said no to.  He told me that no one liked Yoko Ono and showed me a photograph of Salvadore Dali that he had pinched from her.

John Lennon was my favorite Beatle so I'm sure you can imagine how astonished I was to play piano with him.