Elton’s Story

Elton grew up in England with his family, where he played his grandmother’s piano and loved listening to rock and roll songs. He studied at a music school, where he played classical music on the piano. Teachers said that Elton could play songs after hearing them only one time. Elton said that he didn’t always try his best (and sometimes he even skipped classes to ride on the train) but he loved playing music.

His life at home was stressful sometimes because his parents argued a lot. Elton felt scared when he was little because his dad was very strict. Elton said, “The best way to escape it was to shut myself in my bedroom with my record collection and my comics, and drift off into an imaginary world, fantasizing that I was [a rock and roll musician].”

When Elton was 20 years old, he saw a magazine ad that said “Singers and Songwriters Wanted”. He went to answer the ad at an office that was filled with piles of envelopes. Elton felt nervous. He was a shy, chubby young man who was playing piano in a band, but he wasn’t even the lead singer! The man behind the office desk asked Elton, “What can you do?” and Elton replied, “I can sing and I can write songs, but I can’t write lyrics.” The man at the desk chose an envelope from a pile and gave it to Elton. As Elton rode home on the train, he opened the envelope to find poems written by a man named Bernie. (Watch Elton tell the story of meeting Bernie.)

Elton wrote melodies and songs for Bernies poems, but they didn’t have many fans yet. They struggled together for years. Elton wrote songs in his family home out of envelopes of Bernie’s words. Elton had also been interested in fashion and started to wear exciting outfits. He wore big sunglasses, colorful hats, and patterned fabrics. He wore clothes made with sequins, feathers, glitter, or sometimes all of those at the same time! Elton says that his fashion is one of the ways he expressed the way he felt on the inside so that people could see it on the outside. As time passed, and Elton and Bernie wrote more songs together, they gained more fans and more success. Elton and Bernie wrote songs together for 50 years and Elton played them all over the world.

Elton had a difficult relationship with his father. Elton’s dad did not support his musical career. In fact, Elton’s dad never went to see him perform. This made Elton feel bad. Now, Elton is a father and wants to be supportive of his sons as much as possible. He announced that soon he will be done traveling the world to play his music, so that instead he can spend lots of time at home with his husband and sons. But he won’t stop writing and sharing music - Elton loves listening to young, new artists today for inspiration. Elton says, “It’s fun… You have to look at new movies, new music, new books, see new artists…because when you find something new, it inspires you.”

Born March 25, 1947