Michele McLaughlin's Blog

A fantastic artist and album feature page has been posted by One World Music Radio.  Thanks Steve & Chrissie Sheppard!  

I am quite often listening to some sort of music in the background, while I work, or drive around town, or even just chill out.  I absolutely love listening to music I can sing along to, and of course, I adore solo piano music.    Here are some of my favorite places to listen, and favorite playlists & stations:

One of my favorite things is traveling to new and exciting places.  I travel quite a bit when I am touring, and I take a vacation or two with my sister every year.  I’ve traveled all over North America and Europe and can’t wait to go see more of the world.  I’ve been to Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, France, Alaska, Cancun, Portugal, Hawaii, Italy, Greece, Mexico, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, Saint Maarten, the Caribbean and so many places in the US!!  

Wow - what an incredible year this has been!  And I can’t believe how fast it went by.  It seems like not that long ago that 2016 just started, and yet, that was an entire year ago.  I have so much to be grateful for this year… touring adventures, incredible concerts, travel with my sister and friends, a quiet and relaxing summer, working on my album release, and more!  Let’s break this down by month because there was literally something amazing each month this year.

The Christmas season is my favorite time of year because it’s festive and filled with giving, love, family, and togetherness.  Seeing all the Christmas lights and trees makes me happy and filled with joy.  This time of year is the only time of year I like the snow because to me it says, “Merry Christmas!”.  And, it’s the only time of year I get to play music from my two holiday albums, “Christmas - Plain & Simple” and “Christmas - Plain & Simple II”.  I just did my annual Christmas concert at my house concert series, Valley View Concerts, with my guest artist, John Albert Thomas.  It was a lot of fun.

I started releasing albums in 2000, as a way to share music with my friends and family.  At that time, I had no idea this would lead into a full time career.  But here I am, almost seventeen years later, a full time musician who tours regularly, owns my own business, and runs an in-home concert series. I’ve learned a lot about what it takes to make it in this industry as an independent musician and how to be successful at doing so.

Learning piano is something someone anyone at any age can do. It's relaxing, intellectually rewarding, and even occasionally cathartic all at once. It's a perfect pastime for a rainy day and a nice way to spend time with your loved ones. But... 

One of the best parts of learning piano is when you get comfortable enough to start tackling slightly harder pieces. It's fun to learn pieces that are just hard enough to be challenging but aren't super time consuming. To help with that search process, I've listed my favorite pieces from past albums that I think fall into this category along with a few Christmas songs for the holiday season. Let me know how it goes!

I started playing piano when I was about 5 years old.  I would learn to play melodies and songs I had heard by ear.  When I was 8, my parents took me to see George Winston in concert at Abravanel Hall.  I remember watching him play, watching his hands on the keyboard, and being mesmerized by everything he was doing.  I then learned to play a lot of his songs by ear by listening to his CDs over and over, and a short time later, I started writing my own songs.