back to life

My 5th song is Way Down by Elvis Presley. Most of my childhood was spent listening to Elvis’s music as my dad was a huge fan. So I quickly joined him in that love of the great man.

Most people can recall where they were when we learnt of his death, we were on holiday in Weymouth when we heard the news on the radio in our guest house. At the age of 10 I don’t think I realised at the time how big a deal it actually was, but it was the first time I saw my dad cry.

Way Down was the last single released by Elvis before his death, it’s one of my favourites.

The 6th song on my list is Good day sunshine by The Beatles. In my final year of primary school I had the most fantastic teacher, Mr. Parkin. He was so creative in the way he structured his lessons, helping us to learn with competitions and quizzes, he read us books like The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings. He also set up a disco every Friday afternoon.

Music and dance was very important to him and he created a dance group, I remember watching them perform in assembly and thought I definitely wanted to be a part of that. So when I was finally in his class I jumped at the chance to join when he set up a new group. We did a dance routine to this song.

I will never forget Mr. Parkin, he was the best teacher I ever had and I still remember a lot of what he taught me, even after 44 years! he was truly inspirational.