Jim Brickman: Soundtrack to My Life.

Jim Brickman

Tonight I took the kids to their first concert ever.  No it wasn’t Taylor Swift (though they would have loved that) and no, it wasn’t Justin Beiber.  It was legendary contemporary romantic piano artist Jim Brickman.  What? You say.  You took your five year old kids to watch someone play piano for two plus hours at 8:00 PM on a school night?

Why, yes I did.

Can I just say, I’ve wanted to see Jim Brickman perform live for the past fifteen years, way back when I first heard his magical style of hypnotic piano music.  The piano has always had some type of magical spell on me.  I remember once in high school listening in the hallway for hours, to the one kid at my boarding school who
knew how to play it in a way that entranced me.  I’d hide in the hall sitting with my arms around my knees, close my eyes, put my head back against the wall, and let my mind go.  Maybe that’s why, when I discovered Jim Brickman in my early twenties I was instantly in love. He became the soundtrack to my life.

Back then, I was young and in love, and trying oh so hard to be grown up and mature.  So I’d put on one of his albums, poor a glass of wine, light some candles and try to convince my then boyfriend (later husband) how cool and romantic it was.  Then when I was planning my wedding in 2000 I knew there was one song that would need to be played during our ceremony “The Love of My Life“, and during our slide show prior to me walking down the isle we played “Valentine” also by Jim.

And then a few years later in 2003 when my bag was packed to head to the hospital to have Kanen, I made my husband run back in the house for my Jim Brickman cd’s and they played all throughout my labor.  When Kanen was born it was the CD that played in his room at nap and bedtime, and the one I’d play in the car to instantly stop his crying.

Needless to say the same has been true for my girls, and every night of their life they have gone to sleep listening to one of his CD’s.  And then a few months ago we passed the tradition along to my girlfriend and her kids, and I watched how instantly it calmed them the same way it always had my own.

Tonight I got a little teary eyed when my wedding songs played, and again when the lullabies played and I thought… wow this really has been the music that has quietly been there through it all. Through love, happiness, endless joy, heartbreak, rebuilding, and especially parenting.

So I just want to take a moment and say thank you, Jim.  Thanks for so graciously meeting the kids and I after the concert even though we didn’t have passes, and thank you for always being there to calm my nerves and make me feel like no matter what I face… I am never alone.

PS.  I just want to say that moment’s like tonight are amazing for multiple reasons, not the least of which was the simple fact that for the first time I was able to afford to take all four of us to an event like this.  As you know being a single mom and struggling the past few years to get back on my feet, these types of things have been almost impossible for me to do with all of us… so that felt great.  But what felt even better was the fact that my kids were basically the only ones there tonight (think we saw two others about Kanen’s age) and they were amazing! They sat quaintly spellbound (yes my five year olds!) so polite, and adorable and everyone kept coming up to us all night saying how great they were doing and how great it was that I’d brought them and that they could appreciate it. That made me really happy, I want to be the kind of mom who exposes my kids to everything across all sectors of life and it was great to see them love something that I love so much.  Yay to parenting, respectful, gracious well mannered kids, nothing is a bigger accomplishment in life then that!

Yay first concert! There’s Jim Brickman

 

Cheers! Shirley temples and Chardonnay before the show

show time!

Intermission mama time

Fav pic of the night, Mira cuddled up asleep as soon as she heard her “night night song” aweee

Such fun, thanks again Jim for the pic and for hearing our story… so gracious.

 

Sarah Centrella is the author of the book Hustle Believe Receive which teaches you how to apply the #HBRMethod to change your life and live your dream.

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