As a child, I took to playing music as soon as I could sit at the piano. Both my parents were singers and musicians. MY father passed away when I was very young, but his love for music and singing is something he passed on. IN kindergarten, I loved the music sessions where the nun led the music program at school and we would all gather together and she would teach us children’s songs. The nun’s name was Sister Bernadelle Mehmert. She was one in a billion. Then, the next year, in first grade, Sister Benadelle, recognized my natural music abilities and became my first music teacher. She taught me piano, cello, singing and violin from 1st grade up until I graduated in 8th grade and went on to high school at New Trier High School. We were great friends, but it was clear she was dedicated to teaching me all about music and life. Her lessons stay with me still, up until this day, and beyond, and I think about her often. I remember her stressing that “discipline leads to freedom”, especially when it came to learning instruments and singing. Under her guidance, I truly excelled at music and more. I was in 7ths grade, when I started writing my first songs and I still compose daily to this day. As I grew older and began a successful songwriting, performing and composing career, I would often wonder what Sister Bernadelle might have done if she hadn’t chosen to be a nun. She was devoted to Jesus and The Blessed Mother Mary and passed those devotions on to me, but still I wondered. Then I had a dream, where I felt her presence and saw her living on a house boat on a river in Europe. The salon on the boat was filled with musical instruments and art supplies. Then I awoke and wrote my impressions and images down and created this song, “Bernadelle”, on the piano. It is a love song about a photographer who has a dream, and he is inspired to follow the dream and takes a ship across the sea and winds up in Paris where he wanders around the city with his camera. Then he walks to the banks of the River Seine and there he sees a woman sunning herself on the back deck of her house boat….. and then? Well, the song will tell the tale. Enjoy!