Stephen Ridley Unfiltered: The Story Behind the Viral Pianist & Vocalist

Music Matters with Darrell Craig Harris

In this episode of Music Matters, host Darrell Craig Harris interviews viral pianist and vocalist Stephen Ridley about his profound life trans

Key takeaways

• Stephen Ridley transitioned from a high-level career in investment banking to music following the death of his father.
• A pivotal moment occurred in Spain when observing a street performer's lifestyle inspired Ridley to pursue busking.

Main topics

• Career transitions from finance to art
• Defining personal success

Notable quotes

Happiness is for children.

Conclusion

An inspiring testament to the idea that it is never too late to abando

Transcript preview

Speaker 3 (0:00) Welcome to Music Matters Podcast with Darrell Craig Harris. Join us as he explores all things music, bringing you exclusive conversations with Grammy winners, industry insiders, and some of the most exciting new indie artists breaking onto the scene. Speaker 4 (0:27) Stephen Ridley, how are you doing today? I'm good, mate. Nice to see you. So you're in the States, but Speaker 1 (0:32) now I should say, but where are you from originally? I'm from a little village in the north of England with 40 people. Oh, wow. Yeah. That is the humble beginnings. Speaker 4 (0:45) Yeah, awesome. Well, there's something to be said about growing up in a little village. I grew up in LA, which is a big village. Speaker 1 (0:50) That's a big old village. I spent a bit of time in LA. It's a crazy village. Speaker 4 (0:54) Yeah, it's fun and crazy. You have such an interesting story. Many, many people know you. Many of my friends know you. When I mentioned I was going to interview you, you've become very viral online for piano playing and singing, lots of amazing videos on YouTube and other outlets. You have an interesting story, and you actually started your early career in finance. Tell me about that and then how you made the transition to becoming this viral global piano guy. Speaker 1 (1:20) The story's actually not weird if you were living the life with me. I came from a place where most people were unemployed. There was no future there. The nearest town was a place called Sheffield. It went down in the 70s because all the steel went to China and there was kind of just not much going on. And I asked my dad when I was really young, are you happy? And he's like, of course not. Happiness is for children. And I thought, well, then I'm fucked. Speaker 2 (1:47) because I wasn't that happy exactly yeah and I was like Speaker 1 (1:50) shit if this is as good as it gets I'm screwed sorry about my language by the way that's okay and uh And I asked him, well, how do you be happy? And he said, well, if you work really hard at school and you get really good grades, then you can get a really good job. And then that'll be it. And I was like, oh, yeah, okay. It kind of made sense to me. So I worked really hard at school and I got good grades and then I got this job. And it was working in the top team of the top investment bank on the planet. It was very fancy. And I felt very accomplished when I got that job. I thought I'd made it. I remember calling my mom and telling her like, mom, we're going to be rich. It's all, it's all over. There we go. You know, and, but it's a funny thing, dude. Like, I don't know if you've had this in your own life. I'm sure many people can relate that what people tell you is success doesn't quite feel like it. And. It had some kind of prestige with people who I don't really care about. Like people who I don't even admire might think highly of me, but I'd judge them for thinking differently of me just because I worked in a bank. I didn't admire me. That's the point. I didn't do work that I found admirable. I didn't think the job was cool. There was nobody I was looking up to. This didn't really do anything for the world. I didn't feel I was making any meaningful impact of any level. Speaker 2 (3:15) And Speaker 1 (3:15) it all just felt a bit pointless and stale. Speaker 1 (3:20) And, and that was honestly. hard to confront because I'd worked my whole life toward that at that point. Speaker 4 (3:27) It's interesting with that because, you know, it's defining what success means to you, not what it means to other people. And I've definitely been there too. I've had multiple, I do multiple things, but I learned that as a lesson as an old guy, you know, I'm like early 60s or whatever, but I've learned that it's really important to define what success means to you. Is that kind of where you came to in that place? Speaker 1 (3:49) Yeah, absolutely. And I'll be interested to compare notes what you think success is. I'm very interested, by the way, very curious about people. And one of the first things I'd love to ask someone is, you know, what's an ideal scene of a life look like to you? And man, the variety in those answers is beautiful, beautiful. And so, of course, there's no success and it's definitely not linear. And I was just lucky to learn that. at that age. Because some people learn that when they're 40, they climb the corporate ladder and then they get there and then they're like, wait a minute. Speaker 4 (4:21) Yeah. And some people never learned that lesson. And Speaker 1 (4:24) most people never learned that lesson because it's scary to look at. It's scary to look at all my decisions up until this point were maybe not the best ones. That's quite something to own. But in that situation, there was no choice. And I'm really curious. All right, Daryl, what's your, what's success to you? Speaker 4 (4:40) You know, I was just having this conversation with a very successful friend. And I said, you know, the thing for me is I'm an experienced collector. I'm not a money collector. And I've been really fortunate to do many different things. I was a bass player with Cirque du Soleil for many years. I'm now a Sports Illustrated photographer. I'm a podcaster. I guess for me, it's really about feeding my curiosity. I don't want to, on my last day, I don't want to sit there and think, wow, I sure got a big car and a really nice house. And I want to actually take my experiences with me. So that's my definition of success is being happy. It's not about collecting money. We're taught that that's success, but that's, for me, it's not the point. Speaker 1 (5:23) I love it, dude. I love it. I think it's... Speaker 1 (5:28) Look, advertising is a very loud thing and it pushes product. And so it makes you think that you need money because all... They have the funding, right? They're spending the money on the ads. I know this because I have a school and we spend money on ads. You spend money on ads, it means your message can be very loud. But when all of the loud messages are either divisive political messages, which are really trying to push an agenda, or... things which are trying to make you buy stuff you get this idea of a false idea of the importance of money and some of the much more important things which don't have ad campaigns can easily be forgotten and what you just said there on experience is such a I mean it resonates with me very deeply I always wanted adventure success to me is a feeling and a constant feeling of adventure of a balance of like unknown and risk and a bit of fear And all of that good stuff. Fear Speaker 4 (6:25) is a good thing, right? People are afraid to be afraid, but actually that's when you learn the most is when you're the most uncomfortable, right? Speaker 1 (6:31) Yeah. And I don't do well in comfort. I get very depressed. If I'm comfortable, I'll get depressed pretty quick. Like too long doing nothing and I start going cuckoo. I need a bit of, I need a game. I need, I need something. Speaker 4 (6:44) Tell me about making the transition from that. And I'm sure your parents were just thrilled when you told them, hey, I want to play piano and I want to sing. They were probably like, wow, that's great. Yeah, they were like, dude, that's a great idea. We Speaker 1 (6:55) really support that. Speaker 4 (6:57) You're going to be Speaker 1 (6:58) really successful. Speaker 4 (6:59) Yeah, yeah. Tell me about that transition and even just telling them. I mean, that must have been pretty intense. Speaker 1 (7:06) Well, my dad died when I was 15 and he was instrumental in me quitting because I held my dad. in his last three minutes and I was trying to save his life and he couldn't speak but we had a very very real very vivid communication in those last moments and it was very clear to me that he was dying with a lot of regret he knew he was going to die in those moments it was a sudden death but he knew he was going to die in those last three minutes he knew what was happening and I just knew this was this towering hero figure was now very vulnerable and very scared and very regretful. But it was the regret that really impinged on me. Because this was a man who'd had the same dreams his whole life. And he hadn't gone after most of them. And I know that because I heard them over and over and over again. Speaker 4 (7:59) And Speaker 1 (7:59) that was the most moving thing about him dying. It wasn't just the loss of a friend and a leader and all those things. It was just... is that it is that it that Speaker 4 (8:12) all there is Speaker 1 (8:12) right is that it dude and and now he made sense out of that because it was a rational thing and he should do it you've got bills to pay and blah blah blah and retirement and all those things but in the end Speaker 1 (8:26) like it was an altered importance. And then I find myself a few short years later in the same situation. I'm in a life that it's not like I was desperately uncomfortable. I was just stale and, and it, and Speaker 4 (8:43) fulfilled totally. Speaker 1 (8:44) And I, and, and so then to answer your question on my mom, I called my mom and to be honest, I was kind of looking for permission. It was about a week before I quit and I called her at four in the morning. and I was working on some projects. I've not been to bed in ages and I was losing, my hair was falling out and that was really affecting me. And I called her and was like, mum, like I'm literally hallucinating. I'm having micro sleeps. I'm miserable. I don't think I can do this anymore. I don't know what to do. And what I wanted her to say to me was, Stephen, Stephen, nothing's worth this. What are you doing? And what she actually said is, Stephen, everyone's miserable. At least you're getting paid for it. Just crack on. And I hated that. idea. Yeah. As a mom, you can get it, you get it. But, but as a human Speaker 4 (9:30) and you're struggling, it's Speaker 1 (9:32) like, yeah, exactly. And, and, uh, I love it a bit. So now if she was on this podcast, she'd be telling you how, you know, she always said that I should do that. And, but honestly, in the moment when I told her I quit, she told me that she was extremely, extremely upset and begged me to go and beg for the job back. She's like, Stephen, you don't understand what you've done. You're young, you're naive, you're stupid. You don't understand the opportunity that you've got in that thing. Like you didn't have the childhood that I had. Right. And you don't know what it's like. Like you need to go and get that back because life's hard and you're not hard and you need to go fucking get that job back. And she had some valid points. Life is hard. Well, but at the same time, you got to follow your heart. Yeah, but you know, it's like you got to be careful who you're listening to. My mom's my best friend. She's my favorite person in the world, but she hasn't done any of the things I want to do. Speaker 2 (10:28) She worked in Speaker 1 (10:29) a government hospital as a midwife her whole life, serving people in an amazing way. Over 30,000 people are alive because of that woman. She's an amazing woman. But I didn't want to be a midwife and I didn't want to live in the same place my whole life. And I had a much higher itch. to go and see the world and get grazes on my knees and wrinkles and I want to go live that life. And so if I take that advice, I'm going to have that outcome. Now, the thing that was tough for me, to be totally honest, and why I love doing these podcasts is I'd never met anybody who had what I would consider an adventurous, interesting life. And I didn't really have access to that. And so when I went out to do this, everybody I knew, And when I say everybody, there was not a single sole exception. Everybody. treated me as if I'd lost my mind. And I don't mean that funny in a funny way. Like they treat me like I was actually insane. Like, I 100 % get it because I've been there. Speaker 4 (11:30) Like, what do you mean you want to be a professional musician? I'm like, I've always said, actually, that if you can't dissuade somebody from doing that, that's the only time they should probably do it. They have to be so delusional and so 100 % in that that's the only Speaker 1 (11:45) way it's actually going to work, right? Maybe. Or maybe, like, for me, it was always very frivolous because I never thought I'd actually be a musician. I thought I'm just having fun for a month or two, and then I'll have to go back to the real world. And then a month became three, became six, became a year, became two years, and now here we are, you know, over a decade later. Speaker 4 (12:04) That's how that goes. It's funny, isn't it? Yeah, because