The Black Belt
The Early Hook: Finding My Fight
For 13 years of my life, starting at the age of 12, I punched and kicked people in the face on a regular basis—and got hit back, rightly so. In 2017, I was awarded a black belt in kickboxing.
Learning a martial art whilst simultaneously working towards a career in music has its profound benefits. I wouldn't have the understanding of discipline I have now if it wasn't for those years spent in the dojo.
I absolutely LOVED kickboxing. I remember exactly how I started—we had just moved into a new area in Croydon and the club was literally opposite my house. I picked up the phone, and a 12-year-old me said to the chief instructor, 'I want to do kickboxing,' and before I knew it, I was hooked. I used to train for three hours a day, six days a week. It was one of those times during the day that felt like it was just mine. I could let off steam, chat with friends, and jump around throwing all sorts of cool shapes. It was just so fun! I immediately loved the ritual, the sense of commitment and community. There’s also something extremely powerful about knowing you know how to defend yourself on the streets (and living in Croydon, that comes in handy let me tell you).
The Grind for the Grade
The grading for the black belt was grueling. 100 pushups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squat thrusts—and that was just the warm-up. It was roughly four hours of sparring, pad work, floor routines, skipping, and a delicious 10-minute horse-riding stance to finish (for those that don't know, you basically have to sit in a squat position for 10 minutes). Back then, we weren't even allowed a drink break. And honestly, I loved every fucking minute. I have to swear so you get just how much I loved it.
The Performance Parallel
There's a lot that is mirrored between stepping onto a stage and stepping into a ring. I remember the first competition I fought in—there is no amount of training that can prepare you for the adrenaline you experience when in a ring. Needless to say, it didn't go well, and I walked away carrying my tail between my legs. I was shocked at how hard it was and left feeling a bit sorry for myself.
It’s a bit like when you do a performance; it just never goes how you'd like or expect. You can practice for hours and hours, and it will still be different in performance. Fighting is the same. You can perfect a kick or a punch, but that all goes out of the window under pressure. With experience, of course, it gets easier. But I think musicians should learn how to become ‘fighting fit’ —that's where you really learn the lessons.
The Black Belt's Top Tips for Musicians
Here are my top tips for musicians, taken straight from the black belt perspective:
Don't forget the full routine: Always warm up, cool down, and stretch. Consistency prevents injury.
Show up every day: Even when you don't want to. Even when it's cold, raining, a heatwave—whatever. No excuses.
Show respect: To your peers, your teachers, your instrument, and to yourself.
Learn how to make mistakes: Style them out and move on. Dwelling on a mistake is how you lose the fight.
When you fall down, get the fuck back up.
Reclaiming the Fighter
Amidst the chaos of my divorce, I forgot this powerful part of me, but she’s coming back. Martial arts teaches you respect for others, but most essentially, respect for yourself. No matter what happens in your life, you always deserve respect.
Since my fighting days, I try to keep up yoga and running when I can, but sadly a leg injury meant I had to take quite early retirement from kickboxing. And I miss it dearly. But the lessons will stay with me as I continue on this path: stay focused, stay disciplined, build strength and build courage. And most importantly, learn how to get smacked in the face every now and then, because life does that.
The Playlist
On November 12th 2020, I lost my dad to the bitch that is cancer. Exactly 5 years ago today. 5 years, crikey! He was 62, a Hugh Grant lookalike (god, did he love that) and he was deeply unapologetic. He wasn’t a musician in a practical sense (my mum bought him a drum kit that he literally never touched), but he was a musician in his soul. The last message I ever received from him was a link to a Jeff Buckley track, Grace. He died only a few days after that. In the months leading up to his death, he started putting together a playlist for me and my three siblings. He called it Ophelia’s Education.
On it is everything from Led Zeppelin to Art Tatum, Peter Gabriel to the Foo Fighters, George Michael to Madonna, Steely Dan, The Beatles…tons of Bowie of course, with sprinklings of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. The list goes on for 54 tracks - 5hrs 42 mins to be precise. It’s eclectic, raw, vibrant and very ‘main character’ vibe. My dad made a point of saying this was not necessarily his favourite music - it was simply music that meant something. It was a curated curriculum designed to prepare us for the turbulent realities of the world. It’s an education of the soul.
It wasn't a lesson on music, it was a lesson on life. The pain of heartbreak, the need for rebellion, and the importance of reflection. I’ve turned to this playlist when I’ve struggled to find answers and when I so desperately wanted to hear his voice again. You know when you could just really do with some advice from a parent - well, this playlist is all we’ve got left from dad, and if we listen carefully enough, the answers are all there.
I sometimes look back at messages we exchanged, and this one from him will stay with me forever:
“I’ve always thought that for you to unlock your real potential you need to feel a little more about what you do and express yourself with courage. You can’t commit your life just to get someone else’s notes right. That makes you a machine. I don’t want to watch you with my fingers crossed hoping you get all the notes right. I want to watch you express yourself whether the music is perfect or not. It’s way harder than practicing of course, but performance is precisely that. The transference of human emotion through expression”.
What I’ve learnt from my dad’s life is that humans are complicated. He was far from perfect. But despite the mistakes he made along the way, he loved, made deeply inappropriate jokes to waiters in restaurants, and declared that his body just be ‘thrown in a skip’ when he dies. His sense of humour was macabre, dry, inappropriate, but so him.
Dad, if you are out there somewhere (preferably not in a skip) and you are watching us, I hope we are making you proud.
Love, the kids x
The Parallel
Welcome back - In case you’ve forgotten, this blog is a space for me to share my journey with you - the ups, the downs and everything in between. Using words instead of musical notes is turning out to be rather cathartic - just don’t expect my novel any time soon! I’ve always preferred reading little dots on lines rather than words on a page, but life, it turns out, is full of surprises!
The word Divorce (written with a capital D of course for full impact), carries a significant weight to it. Even the sound of it makes my eyes feel heavy. Millions of people have to go through it, and we all know someone who’s experienced it. You might be even going through a divorce as you read this. Each experience is different, some bad, some good. My experience was not necessarily unique - but what might be unusual is how the process of recording an album seemed to sync up coincidentally with the divorce process. This post talks about what happened between the offer to create the album - to the final day of the recording.
With the offer from the label officially in my inbox, I took a big step - to apply for a full time masters course at Trinity Laban. I’d never been to music college (more on that in another post to come), and with the offer from the record label, I felt a pull to seek out mentorship on a serious level. The year between the audition and beginning of studying was one of the worst in my life. My separation was messy, traumatic and devastating. I felt like I was being dragged backwards through hedges, barely able to breathe. A lot happened. Walking through the doors of Trinity’s music department in September 2024, I instantly knew I was right where I was meant to be. It felt like a sanctuary. I could indulge in Kapustin’s music and my tutors never tried to influence my choices - in fact, they encouraged me and let me explore the repertoire freely.
Every spare minute I had, around studying and teaching little ones where middle C was for the hundredth time, I was playing Kapustin. I’d always had a good relationship with practice, but when you find yourself in the middle of a breakdown, playing becomes something entirely different. I couldn’t physically do anything else other than play. Have you ever woken up everyday feeling like someone is standing on your chest? I have. And it sucks. Knowing I had access to a piano became the only reason I even got up.
The divorce wasn't just a legal filing; it was a series of cruel, final coincidences. I will never forget our last necessary meeting to sign the contracts for the sale of our flat. We had to meet in Hatton Garden, London's famous diamond and luxury jewellery district. The sheer irony of the location was staggering: we had bought our wedding rings in Hatton Garden to begin our life together, and we were forced to return there to finalize the sale. This last, painful and legal meeting took place on our actual wedding anniversary—this time last year. The timing of it all felt like a huge middle finger from the universe.
So…the recording venue and dates were secured. Now I had to just get myself there and play. The whole process took me 6 days, split up into two groups (3 days in November 2024, and 3 days in April 2025). Various pianist friends suggested more days, some even less days - it seems there is no ‘right’ way to do this - so I just went with my gut and got it all done. By the time the first recording date came around, I was still legally married. On the last day of the November recording session, I received a phone call mid session. It was the estate agent informing me that the flat I had purchased with my husband had officially sold. Then, on the final day of the April session, an email from a solicitor comes with a very legal financial order attached. More painful synchronicity that I couldn't have predicted would happen in tandem. As I was pouring myself into these tracks, the universe kept throwing me rocks. I honestly couldn't believe the timing. I spent every day after recording sitting in the bath crying.
I’ve always been a somewhat spiritual person, but I felt something larger at play during this time. When I received the takes back from the engineer I was honestly shocked at what I was listening to. Was that me playing? I’d been in 'Survivor Mode', as we call it. Get up, play, cry, sleep. So hearing it all back was bizarre. And now you are all about to hear it too. Yikes.
I write this on what would have been my 4th wedding anniversary, and 15 years together. Some people make it further than this, and some not even as far. When you go through a loss, there are different ways in which people cope. Some distract, avoid or go off the rails completely. For me, I faced it head on, but not alone - with the piano under my fingers through all the blood, sweat and absolutely mammoth tears.
Here’s to Kapustin—the man who never knew I existed, but whose rigorous structure carried me through the worst days of my life. And I promise to keep the next post a bit less ‘divorcy’. Cheers!
The Beginning
It all begins with an idea.
I’ve decided to start writing a blog. Lucky reader, this is my first post! Instead of only posting on social media, mostly surface level, algorithm pleasing crap, I want somewhere I can express the deeper meaning of why I do what I do. So, if you are interested in the ‘why’, then keep reading.
The past few years have been quite the whirlwind. If anyone had said to me at the end of 2022 that in three years time I would have gotten divorced, started a masters, and recorded an album of Kapustin, I wouldn’t have believed you. Infact, I would have definitely not believed you. Yet, here we are. I am only a few weeks away from releasing the album that saved me.
I remember clearly the moment that James, the engineer at Divine Art recordings, invited me to create this album. In August 2023, I was attending Chethams International Piano Summer school, as I always did and had been doing for 7 years prior. James was there filming mostly young artists and amateur pianists for their own personal portfolios. It was the final night of the course, and like everyone else, I had too much to drink and ended up staying up till 5am chatting with lifelong friends about all geeky piano things. The next morning, I had been scheduled for a 9am recording session in the Stoller Hall. I hadn’t even packed! I thought to myself, just throw on your fanciest frock, slap some makeup on, and play, who really cares anyway! I came out onto the stage, greeted James and explained my current sleepless slightly drunken state, who was ready with his camera and mic setup, and played a few of the Kapustin concert etudes. At the end of the session, James said to me, ‘you know, you should do an album’.
What James doesn’t know is that two days later, my marriage ended. I had separated only a few months before and had spent the time leading up to Chethams barely coping. Playing Kapustin was quite literally all I was able to do whilst I watched the life I had spent my entire adult life building crumble right in front of me. 13 years of a partnership and 2 years of a marriage. I sat at the piano every single day as it was the only thing in my life that made sense. The only safe place I had. The complexity of Kapustin’s music perfectly mirrored the complexity of my situation - the rigorous structure of classical form meets the improvisational chaos of real life.
When I recorded Kapustin: Between the Lines, I wasn't searching for a career move; I was searching for an anchor. The rhythm, precision, and unyielding discipline required by these 20 tracks were the only things strong enough to hold me steady while my world—my marriage, my home, and my safety—collapsed.
I speak honestly about struggle—about the grief, the emotional abuse, and the mistakes I made in desperation—because I believe the greatest art is only possible when we stop pretending to be perfect. This space is where I share the 'Why' behind the piano: how self-awareness, accountability, and the sheer power of music saved me. My goal is to inspire others to find their own anchor, proving that structure can be a lifeline in the face of despair. This blog is designed to give me my own space to share my story, peeling back the layers of the fancy frock to explore the structure and vulnerability underneath. I’ve come to realize that sharing my own truth makes me feel less alone. If you’ve ever found an anchor in your own life—in music, in work, or in an honest conversation—then please stick around. We’ve already made a very good start.