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Audience Development Group, Donald Gould, Florida Keys, Motivational, Music, Piano, Piano Keys, Sarasota, Tim Moore, YouTube
If you are looking for a definitive Florida west coast panorama, you will find it in Sarasota’s sparkling water bejeweled with its keys: Longboat, Siesta, Lido and Bird lying just off-shore connected by scenic causeways. And in downtown Sarasota you will find other keys… on ornate upright pianos adorning Sarasota sidewalk venues where you can actually sit down and play.
A couple of weeks ago near a sidewalk art exhibit, Donald Gould, an alarmingly thin homeless guy sat down to play his version of Styx’ “Come Sail Away.” With unkempt scraggly hair and beard Gould kept his eyes down concentrating on the keys. One passerby, then two, then ten, then fifty cloistered around his amazing concerto while music drifted over the magical setting.
Gould, known by locals only as “Boone” said he only hoped to “raise a few bucks”. A week later his performance had been viewed by nearly 8 million on YouTube and almost 6 million times on Facebook. A local videographer offered “Now he has the chance to be something more than an occasional nuisance downtown.” Gould has since been awarded an account of $35,000, given temporary housing and awarded a full scholarship to finish his college degree. Best of all, he has been reunited with his long lost son.
Every picture tells a story, every journey has its end. Gould’s somewhat checkered life has many missing pieces; it is unclear how he became homeless… then there were the drugs and alcohol. Framing his story is the redeeming fact that he has exceptional musical talent – not just “good” but concert worthy as if he had once climbed the steps at Julliard or Eastman.
Donald Gould’s story deepens; he played the clarinet in the Marine Corps, and the Michigan man says his music took him around the world before he was 21 years old. He was “riding a rocket”, learning music theory and ear training while learning to play multiple instruments with a dream to teach. But sometimes, just on the other side of the “sun and honey’ days of success waits disaster. Drugs took hold, his wife died and his 3 year old son, Donny, was secreted away by social services. Gould says, “There’s not a day goes by I don’t think of him.”
The next chapter is yet to be written. Back in Michigan, WOOD TV (Grand Rapids) connected Donald with his son, which both father and son agree was poignant. “I always hoped you’d clean up your act so we could see each other again, Dad” said son Donny. “I hope to make that happen son” said Gould.
His story could belong to any one of us. Small twists and turns, one wrong decision and it can all spin out of orbit. For some it was simply the music of our youth when we thought we knew everything about life and had the world by the tail, not yet knowing there was a “tiger” on the other end.
Oscar Wilde had it right, “There are only two tragedies in life; one is not getting what one wants and the other is getting it”. Today in Sarasota, the keys waft a song out over the bay and through the streets….there sits Donald Gould in his new found limelight, adored by passersby. Here is hoping it sticks this time.
Tim Moore, Audience Development Group, http://www.audiencedevelopmentgroup.com