Formative years

I'm not really sure why I'm writing this, who will see it, or even why I'm even bothering to write it, but with time on my hands, I can't think of any reason not to.  So, this my first blog, marks the start of a new adventure, focusing more on the positives I can control in my life,  so please be gentle as we embark on this journey together.  Although perhaps before getting lost in the weeds, I should start by first rewinding a little, to bring you up to speed on the events that brought me to where I am today...

Well, my name is Robert F. Sheppard and I share a passion for composing music with my paternal family, despite neither them or I,  having ever pursued this as a career choice. 

At an early age, I first became obsessed with playing the drums, having had the opportunity to listen to my elder brother's band, rehersing every Saturday at local venue, close to our then family home in the UK Midlands. 

My brothers exhibited musical talents at a very young age, following in my father's footsteps, adopting the guitar as their primary instrument.  One brother playing rhythm guitar, and the other, the bass guitar. I guess my fathers fondness of playing popular music of that era, was instrumental (pardon the punn), in shaping and guiding my brothers musical interests, culminating in them starting their own pop band together. A school friend of theirs, often sang with them, and together they all set out to find a "band manager", who was later to get them their first local gigs. My father performed with them too, as part of a variety act, which was popular at the time.  My mother didn't play an instrument, but she threw herself into supporting her husband and her two sons, encouraging them to pursue their passion for music,  despite our family not being wealthy in the financial sense. I really should mention that at this time, my brothers had only just started senior school, and with little competition then by way of boy bands, they became very popular, very quickly!

It wasn't long before the band auditioned for a drummer, sparking my own fascination, in the rhythmic sound of live drumming. I'm not sure whether it was the adrenaline from the heart pumping beats, or the tonal qualities that interested me most.  Regrettably, I was too young to join the band, and I was encourage like so many other children, to pursue the piano as my main instrument, rather than my new found obsession, to become a drummer.

My brothers went on to have numerous gigs/successes, and even appeared on a children's TV show in the mid 70's, which boosted their popularity even further, thereby becoming something of local celebrities with their school friends and  following, long before the internet was even a thing.

My parents later decision to relocate to Shropshire, took its toll on the band members friendships, and perhaps due to distance, different friendship groups, their young age, and other influences of the time, the band ultimately disbanded. Despite a number of attempts to regain their prior popularity in their new and emerging home of Telford New Town during the late 70's, the "middle of the road" music scene, had taken an adrenalin rush of its own, which left all bands looking for a new style, sound, and image, that could compete in what is still today,  such an iconic and popular music era.

I'm pleased to note, that one of my brothers continues to write songs to this day, but regrettably he keeps them for his own gratification. My mother often tells the story of how her son refused an offer from a popular celebrity for his music catalogue. I guess my brothers ambition to perform his own music his way never died, and in my humble opinion, his rightful place in the music industry, is still yet to be realised!

Growing up, I was always one of his biggest fans, and I was overjoyed when he taught me how to compose my first song. I only came third in my school song contest with the first composition he helped me to write for myself. Looking back, sythersizers were too new and radical at the time to compete with more mainstream vocal angelica, or that's what I like to tell myself. Lol.

My school was fortunate enough to have their own stage, studios, and instruments, including pianos, drums, amps, guitars, etc. and my new obsession, a bright yellow wasp synthersizer!  Of course I joined the school orchestra as a drummer, and learnt to play all of the instruments in a fashion, but the wierd and wonderful electronic sounds, we're a whole new frontier for me. I didn't know anything about sound modelling at the time, and yes, writing down all the settings of the myriad of wasp dials was tedious, especially  if I ever wanted to recreate the exact same fat analogue sound I had stumbled upon. 

Despite taking music as an option at school, and having weekly piano lessons, I failed my music exam abysmally. I had every encouragement and opportunity to pass with flying colours, but the studio draw and teenage distractions, outweighed my interest in practicing or curiculm study.  For me, music was a piece of my soul, a feeling and an emotion that could not be quantified by notation, or so I thought. I'm not sure why, but musical score always felt mechanical to me, like you became an extension of a whirlitzer, or a music box, were emotion, feeling, and expression, are lost to tempo, quantization, and the seereing thought of your piano teacher slapping a plastic rule on the piano music stand before you, in time with the tic-toc of an intimidatingly placed metronome.

Looking back at these formative years, it's hard to comprehend how my love for music composition ever endured. But then along came the synthersizer pioneers, whom I first heard when they were blasting out of my brothers huge high end, high fidelity stack system (remember this is before the internet), for which he had been working very hard to save for. That was the moment that my love of sythersizers and electronic music, was truly born!

Untill next time... may your own musical interests, explore the very depths of your soul, without compromise or explanation. Love and light to you all.