VITULA LOCUS (Violin Place) DAY 1

 A new blog! How often does this happen?

This is the story of how I became a Violin Virtuoso and played at the Proms! 

It all began when I listened to Classic FM on the radio as I painted in my studio. I painted seven days a week, 12 hours a day, and so I had become immune to interruptions. I sometimes turned the radio down if it got noisy but generally my background was classical music which I heard and enjoyed but which never broke my concentration. As my best friend and granddaughter, Giselle, will confirm, the only thing that can stop me when I'm in full flow is what she calls, a 'crossroads'. I'd better explain the concept of crossroads, before I continue my story.

'Crossroads' began, or at least when I first noticed them, when I was conscripted into the Royal Air Force as a sheet metal worker; an AC2 the lowest rank in the Air Force. I had done a five year apprenticeship to become a shipwright, but this meant nothing to the powers-that-be, I was just a body that belonged to them for two years. But in the RAF, you may not be surprised to learn, I noticed aeroplanes ... 'crossroads' ... 10 years later I was flying the Queen around Africa and the Prime Minister to Washington, not at the same time you should understand! 

After years of flying long range, I found myself in Germany with jet fighters and most nights at home. This meant I could have a hobby and so I started Pen and Ink drawing ... "Crossroads"... within the first two months I had sold 170 copies of my drawings of Rhine Castles.

Commissions poured in and within two years I had to leave the RAF to become a professional artist. Within months we - my long suffering wife was very much part of everything I did - won  'Wiltshire New Business of 1983' and with it came a free accountant and an agent in Bath.

I'm not going to bore you further with detail, but here in summary are the crossroads that followed:

Computing: !988 Winner Most Innovative Software in British Industry 1988

Award at National Exhibition Centre Dinner

I could go on but I'm getting bored. 

So there I was painting in my studio to a background of classical music on Classic FM. When I found I couldn't paint for the tears in my eyes. I was forced to stop to listen to a violin. This happened a few times and I noted it was only the music of one particular violinist that was forcing me to listen, Nicola Benedetti. 

I assumed Nicola Benedetti would be an elderly Italian, although it did ring a bell in this old brain. In reality she is a thirty-five year old Scottish lass, who had won the UK Young Musician of the Year 2004 when she was 16 ... which had rung the bell for me. 

After sitting for hours listening to her, and watching videos in which she generously spends her time with, and teaching, all levels of musicians, I realised, almost in horror as I'm 84, that I had come to a 'crossroads'. I can't be on the outside of this looking in, I have to be on the inside participating.

Schindler's List Here she is

So in the story of how I became a Violin Virtuoso, this is Day 1 of the story. I wonder how heavy a violin is?