Hey my friend,

Welcome to my funky little world.

And instead of giving you a long introduction to who I am and what Funky ME is, I'd rather start with the moment when I thought music might be over for me.

It starts in Vienna... 

Vienna, a hotel bed, and a bass that stayed in its bag

It was the unison part in Chick Corea's Spain.

I wanted to play it. I really wanted to play it.

Then came the pain. Sharp, in my hand.

I should have seen it coming. I had been fighting tendinitis for four years. It never let me play as much as I wanted.

But this time it felt final.

I sat on my hotel bed in Vienna and took off my headphones.

My roommate was practising. The whole building was full of music. We were all students at a summer course at the American Institute of Music.

For me, it was over.

I could join the rhythm and ear-training classes, but my bass stayed in its bag.

I had one bass lesson left.

And that lesson changed the direction of everything that followed.

**To be continued in your inbox.**

Part two lands there tomorrow — the sentence from that last lesson, and why I had been looking in the wrong place for four years.