About Tim

Tim was born in Kenilworth, Warwickshire, on 29th August 1956, to parents who were farmers at Ravensbridge Farm, Fen End. Whilst being brought up on his father's farm, in his formative years, Tim discovered his love for making music at the tender age of 4 years. He used to watch and listen to his Sunday School teacher play the piano, and he thought "I could do that." One Sunday morning at Bentley Heath, after the church meeting was over, he sneaked into a back room, where he knew there was an old piano amongst some chairs and tables. Tim was in his element and got carried away, totally unaware that his parents were frantically looking for him, and within minutes, was knocking out the tunes of some of the C.S.S.M. choruses he had learnt in Sunday School, his first number being "I am H-A-P-P-Y", followed by "Jesus Loves Me." When he eventually got "caught" by his father, Tim was shocked at his father's reaction, and he will never forget the look on his dad's face, which was a combination of relief that he had found his son, whilst being utterly gobsmacked at hearing his kid play that old piano. The reason Tim was amiss at his dad's surprise, is that he knew no different and just assumed anybody and everybody could play the piano, as in the same way everybody eats and sleeps.

Nowadays, Tim humbly acknowledges the God given musical talent with which he was born, and to use for the blessing and pleasure of others. He continues to develop his gift and has moved on to compose and perform in his own original style. Dots and squiggles on lines are completely foreign to Tim, and having taught himself naturally, "by ear", to this day, unable to read music, he performs without the use of a single note of written music.

Eventually, the family moved to Buckingham and sadly, Tim's musical talent lay dormant for many years. Although he played the piano at home, in all his years of schooling, he only recalls two occasions when he played the piano at school, one being when all the piano playing teachers were absent in assembly one morning, so the headmaster made an announcement requesting for someone to play "He Who Would Valiant Be." Being a shy boy at the idea of playing in front of all the school, his class mates began to say to him, one after the other, "Go on Tim, go and play it, and give it some stick." The headmaster picked up on the murmuring and was rather taken back, when Tim shuffled his way towards the piano, through the standing crowd of kids, sat down at the piano and knocked out the old hymn in his jazzy style. The kids loved it and sang like never before - the teachers were not so sure, or at least, they pretended not to be!

The only other time he played at school was in a Christmas Talent Competition, which he jointly won with his brother, Steve, who did a magic show. Tim's music teachers hated the idea of this "playing by ear stuff" and gave him no encouragement, so much so, that when he chose his ten subjects, tragically, music wasn't one of them. But what's new, Bernie Marsden attended the same school a few years earlier, and got the same treatment, with the exception of one teacher who said to Bernie, "Forget all this school stuff - there's only one way for you and that's playing the guitar", but Tim never met her!

It was many years later, that Tim decided he would aim to become a world class pianist. The first time he went abroad was to Gran Canaria. The hotel provided a babysitting service, so Tim and his wife, Enid, jumped into a taxi and told the driver that they would like to be taken to a place where there was some live music, but not too loud. The taxi driver suggested a Piano Bar in Playa del Ingles and they duly arrived at the venue, which was called "Misty." As they went down the steps and entered, the pianist was actually playing Erroll Garner's "Misty." It was one of those watershed moments in life, for Tim thought, "What a lovely way to make a living", and vowed that, one day, he would play "Misty" as good as that guy did.

Back home, when Tim finished work, which was often late at night, he decided to go to the local Holiday Inn, in Maidenhead, and play the black Grand Yamaha. Night after night, and very often until the early hours of the morning, Tim would play for the guests, until they all went to bed, then carry on during the night, practicing new variations and chord structures, with all the bum notes, into the early hours. Tim was never paid but the hotel provided him with cups of coffee, until one day, when the food and beverage manager told him that the hotel manager was going to get rid of the piano to make room for a new swimming complex, but in appreciation of all the pleasure Tim had brought to the hotel, he wanted him to have the piano. To this day, that same piano still occupies a corner the lounge at home, and was the inspiration of his composition of "Joanna", which is featured on his "Forget-Me-Not" album.

Although Tim has never made it into the big time, his music has brought pleasure to thousands, at home as well as abroad, from Sing-A-Long audiences on honkey tonks, to performing on Liberace's personal grand piano in The Palace, at Sun City, South Africa. Other countries include America, Namibia, the Canaries, Cyprus, around the Caribbean and Mediterranean on cruise liners, as well as at theatres, churches, piano bars, restaurants and hotels in the UK.

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