Bognor welcomes remarkable blind pianist Derek Paravicini

Derek was born at 25 weeks. He was blinded by an overdose of oxygen therapy which also left him with a severe learning disability and autism. He began teaching himself piano at two years old and first shot to fame playing jazz with the Royal Philharmonic Pops Orchestra in London, aged nine. Derek has made numerous concert and television appearances worldwide. He has been called The Human iPod due to his ability to learn thousands of pieces simply by listening to them once. For Bognor, Derek will play a selection of light classical music, jazz and songs from musical theatre. Joining him will be Professor Adam Ockelford, founder of the Amber Trust, a charity that supports visually-impaired children, including those with additional disabilities, who have a talent or love for music, to fulfil their musical potential. The recital will be at the Regis School of Music in Sudley Road, 46 Sudley Road, Bognor Regis, PO21 1ER. bognorregismusic.club.

“I have known Derek a rather sobering 37 years,” Adam said. “He was five. He is blind and has learning difficulties and his parents were looking around a school where I taught in Wandsworth. He had such special abilities and such special needs that they needed a particular school. Like 40 per cent of children that are born blind he had developed perfect pitch, the ability to recognise notes in isolation which is something that happens in the first 24 months of life. It is a remarkable thing. The brain is so plastic at that point. He was not really talking back then and he was pretty wild. He recounts the story better than I do now! But the first time I met him he pushed me off the piano stool where I was teaching a girl. On that first visit he came to the piano and literally shoved us out the way and started playing. He had been teaching himself at that point. His beloved nanny got him a little keyboard to play in desperation because he was only really interested in breaking things back then. Derek started to realise that the things he was hearing he could copy. It was a few months before they realised that there was a special ability there. His sister was the first one I think to notice that he was playing hymn tunes that he had heard. Music has now given him his whole essence, his whole identity. He regards himself now as Derek the pianist. He says ‘I am Derek and I play the piano. What do you do?’ Music is first of all his way of communicating, his way of making friends and really a very powerful way of expressing himself. But because he taught himself early on he developed his own way of playing. My job as a teacher was not to spoil that but just to guide him. He has never lost that way that he started playing and you can tell within ten seconds that it is him playing. There is something very Derek about it. And in a concert he picks up on the various little sounds from the audience, the gasps and the laughs and so on. We've just got back from Israel and he had eight standing ovations over there which he loved, and all he really wants to know now is when the next concert is!”