Nik Kershaw, 68, is an English singer and songwriter, who came to prominence in 1984 with the hits “Wouldn’t It Be Good”, “I Won’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me” and “The Riddle”. He appeared at Live Aid in 1985 and has written for other artists, including Chesney Hawkes’s 1991 number one single “The One and Only”. He lives on the Suffolk borders with his wife, Sarah, and their son Theo, 15. He also has three adult children from his first marriage.
Here, he shares the moments that defined him, from abandoning the violin for the guitar and dealing with screaming fans for the first time, to meeting his wife at an airport, and discovering that his fans now arrive at gigs with their grandchildren.
I only made it halfway through my A-levels. I wasn’t an academic child. I passed my 11-plus and got into grammar school, which made my parents proud, but they stopped being quite so proud when I became very good at getting away with things.
Shorts
The only formal music lessons I had were violin when I was 11 – painful for everyone involved. There was a piano in the house, but I never really took to it. I got my first guitar when I was 14. I’d spend hours in my bedroom with a tape recorder, slowing down Ritchie Blackmore solos and trying to recreate them note for note.
