Episode 38 - Nathaniel Dye: Public Service Announcement
Hello, musically curious people
This is a very unusual episode, and a very personal one.
It’s dedicated to Nathaniel Dye (Nat) — musician, music teacher, brass band obsessive, and a man who somehow managed to combine terminal illness with fundraising, honesty, dark humour, and (yes) the idea of running the London Marathon while playing the trombone.
We open with Nat performing his song “Public Service Announcement” live at my Wilton’s Music Hall show. It’s funny, furious, and painfully practical — a real “please take this seriously” message, delivered with the kind of sharpness that only comes from lived experience.
After that, I share a few short excerpts from my “Listen like a musician” mini-series (a few simple listening handles), before replaying my original conversation with Nat (recorded back in early 2024). In it, Nat talks about what music became for him after his diagnosis — not an escape, but a choice: teaching, making, playing, and using the time properly.
Nat’s music and fundraising work lives on through Bowel Cancer Bucket List, and if you’re able to support it, please do. 💛 You can donate via Nat’s JustGiving fundraiser for Macmillan, or go directly to Macmillan Cancer Support.
If you’d like to explore Nat’s music more deeply, the album I produced with him, Matters of Life and Death is also available on Spotify or other, more ethical streaming platforms.
The episode outro also features Theon Cross, and a distracted Guy Pratt in the closing song.
In this episode
Nat’s live performance of “Public Service Announcement” (Wilton’s Music Hall)
What Nat says about music — and why it mattered more as time got tighter
A few “Listen like a musician” tools: timbre, tension, harmony, musical meaning
Replay: my earlier interview with Nat (from Episode 10)
Fundraising and the ongoing work of Bowel Cancer Bucket List
Episode outro featuring Theon Cross (and a mention of Guy Pratt)
Links & references
Nat / fundraising
Nat’s music
Also mentioned
Support the show
If you’d like to help keep the podcast going (and help me make more things like this), you can support it here:
Stay musically curious. 💛
Full transcript
Steve Pretty:
Hello, my name is Steve Pretty. I'm a musician, performer and composer from London. And welcome to my podcast, Steve Pretty On the Origin of the Pieces.
Steve Pretty:
This is the show that helps you to hear, understand and enjoy music in new ways.
Steve Pretty:
hello musically curious people, welcome to the show. It's lovely to be back in your ears and eyes. And we've got a very special episode today, a very unusual episode. This is an episode that is dedicated to Nathaniel Dye. I'm going to talk a lot more about Nat in this episode, but let's kick things off straight away with a song that he performed at my Wilton’s Music Hall show back in November 2024.
Steve Pretty:
This is Nat’s public service announcement.
Steve Pretty:
It's in my bones, in my liver and left notes. It's a stage full. And I know you surely wondering just how. Well, for me, it bodes. Well. The answer isn't blowing in the wind. There is no chance that this cancer will rescind for. But as long as assembled doctors that agree, then I might last a bit longer with chemo and surgery.
Steve Pretty:
My. But I'm afraid that it is grip of survival. Well, the chances they are slim for in three years. While the best I can be said. Is it at solutely likely that I probably be dead?
Steve Pretty:
If you've started wondering why I'm telling you this now and you've already commence yawning while I urge you to sit up and take notice of this bit, for it serves as a word of warning, for my cancer was discovered far too late, and you'd hope you it you divide my certain fates. So for starters, he fought for a screening test.
Steve Pretty:
Then return it right away to ensure your health at its best.
Steve Pretty:
As for symptoms, even if so, very slight, you do well to see the NHS site for specifics. And if you have a premonition a straight away without delay and consult your physician if uncertain, then the best thing you can do is to ask Shanley, monitor your crew if it changes or if you notice any blood. Then tell your doctor faster than ever I forgot.
Steve Pretty:
Good, because honestly, I did for two late and they not Tipton's for far too long, so please make sure you don't hesitate. And remember, there's some.
Steve Pretty:
If you're younger. Cancer may seem quite absurd, and you may well have to shout just to be heard. But for my sake, please stop for fear. Because if you catch this early, you're more likely to be hit.
Steve Pretty:
So with that few shots, months or years that I have left, I'll tell my story. So if you are, people are bereft of the long life that I, for one, don't have a head for. It's absolutely likely well-nigh. What? Uncertain? Absolutely likely that I probably be dead. I'll be dead.
Nathaniel Dye:
Do nothing. Not die, Nathaniel Dye!
Steve Pretty:
So that was Nat’s song. Public service announcement called that for obvious reasons. Do what the song says. Above all, do what the song says. But you can also check out that song along with the rest of Nat’s album, in all the usual music streaming places. So do go ahead and do that as you may have gathered, or maybe you've even seen it in the press.
Steve Pretty:
Very sadly passed away about ten days ago due to complications from the bowel cancer that he talked about in that song and in so much of the rest of his work. It was an extraordinary guy. I'm going to talk more about him later, but I'm very flattered to say that he was also a big fan of the podcast and a big part of the podcast as well.
Steve Pretty:
He appeared back in episode ten, and I'm going to rerun that interview a little bit later. But he also appeared at Wilton’s Musical, did those, did those songs. He was also a hugely passionate advocate for music education. He was an award winning music teacher in schools and he conducted brass bands. He played in punk and scar bands. He was a passionate musician of all sorts, and then we recorded this album of piano ballads, and I didn't know that Nat even played the piano.
Steve Pretty:
That didn't even know that he played the piano, to be honest.
Steve Pretty:
But he dedicated himself to learning the piano like he dedicated himself to so much in his life. In those last couple of years, he was such a passionate advocate for music education, and we really hit it off on that. And again, that's why he appeared on the podcast and episode ten and then the live shows and why I'm dedicating this episode to him today.
Steve Pretty:
So I'm sure Nat would support me in carrying on what I did in the last episode, which was just replaying some of the bits I did over Christmas, which I called the 12 Days of Listeners. At the time, I've stripped all the Christmas stuff out, don't worry. But before we dig into some of the rest of Nat’s legacy and the interview that I did with him and some more of his music and thoughts, I'm going to just play days five to was it five, five, six, seven, eight of my listeners series that I put out on social media?
Steve Pretty:
So here's just a few little excerpts of how to listen a bit more like a musician. How to make active listening a part of your life. Here we go.
Steve Pretty:
It's day five. I'm in my studio today, and I'm building on the work of the last few days where we've been talking about music in time. Now we're moving on from time to what I call color now, I think this can encapsulate everything from melodies to harmony and everything in between.
Steve Pretty:
But before we even get to that, we need to talk about the sound of the note itself, right? We've only been looking at rhythm so far. Now we need to zoom in on the note itself, and I think the sound of a note is as important as the note itself and the melody or whatever that it goes on to produce.
Steve Pretty:
So here's what I mean.
Steve Pretty:
Now all of those instruments playing that tune were in the same pitch, but they've all got a very, very different characteristic. So today's exercise is very simple. Tune your ears in to do some active listening to whatever music it is you're listening to, and think about the different instruments in that mix. It might be a big piece of orchestral music.
Steve Pretty:
What's got the tune? Why have they chosen that? Or it might be in a song. The song is going to be singing the tune, but what are the other instruments behind it, or is there another instrument doubling the tune in the voice, or what are the characteristics of that singer's voice? So before we can get into melodies and harmony and anything else, think about the quality of the note itself, because that itself can tell a very, very important story.
Steve Pretty:
And it's a very active choice that we as composers and musicians make. And a very helpful thing, I think, as a listener, to tune your ears into, to listen like a musician, because that's what we're here to
Steve Pretty:
So yesterday we talked about the same notes. Sounding different in different instruments and why that is important. Today we're going to have the same instrument but different notes and why that is important because this is the foundational element of melody and harmony.
Steve Pretty:
So the core concept today is that notes don't exist in a vacuum. What we're looking at today is how notes relate to one another, and that is how our brain perceives music. So I'm going to play this note on my lovely roads over here and on my flugelhorn. I'm going to play some notes over the
Steve Pretty:
top.
Steve Pretty:
And every one of those has got a particular color.
Steve Pretty:
And some of those colors feel quite nice, and some of them feel a little bit more classy, but we can have a whole palette of those colors, and that is what we call a scale or a mode. So.
Steve Pretty:
That is one color. What we can do is we can swap out one or more of those notes, and it will change the whole feel of it. I'm going to move from one palette to a completely different palette now, and it's important to remember all you're hearing at any one time is two notes. Then the sound of the roads over here and the notes I'm playing on top.
Steve Pretty:
But your whole perceptual framework of how you understand and hear that music will feel different, even though you're only ever hearing two notes at the same time.
Steve Pretty:
One of the things I think that really puts people off music in music theory is all of the scales. The most important way of thinking about this is to think about these things as colors, as choices. There's no right or wrong per se, but they all have different feelings. That's what we're really coming back to as composers and musicians is what that makes us feel when we hear those different palettes, when we shift from one thing to another.
Steve Pretty:
So your active listening exercise for today is just to really zoom in on that sense of color. Within a piece of music are the note choices that the composer or songwriter has made? Are they creating tension? Are they creating release? Often they'll be doing both, but sometimes they might shift. Does it shift between the verse and the chorus?
Steve Pretty:
For example, really zero in on the notes that are being played? Don't worry what they are, just think about how they make you feel.
Steve Pretty:
top.
Steve Pretty:
today we're talking about what happens when two notes or more play together. So I've got this lovely Indian shruti box to help me illustrate this.
Steve Pretty:
And if I play this one note and I can add another note.
Steve Pretty:
Now in music we call that the interval of a fifth. And you can hear that those notes sound kind of what we call consonant together. In other words, they sound nice together. And there is a physical reason for that. That is because the vibrating air from that first note, the C is coming at me. Let's say here's the frequency spectrum of that note.
Steve Pretty:
In other words, the vibrations per second that is coming to me through the air there and here is the frequency of that G the fifth above. So that's lining up like this right there, kind of stacked on top of one another in a beautifully organized mathematical way. So once again, let's do that. Right. Those are consonant notes. Dissonance is also very, very important in music.
Steve Pretty:
And that is where the frequencies don't line up like that. They don't stack on top of one another neatly. So if I play instead this.
Steve Pretty:
Those notes are very close in pitch to one another. But the frequency spectrum of each of those notes don't line up like that. They kind of wobble between them like that. And in fact, if you really tune your ears in to listen, you can hear a kind of pulsing and that is the the waveforms of each of these notes just interacting in a slightly uncomfortable way.
Steve Pretty:
You can almost hear.
Steve Pretty:
And that is the essence of harmony, because musicians manipulate consonance versus dissonance, right? Because music is there, at least in part, to express our deepest emotions as humans. I think it's one of the purest ways we have got to do that. And human emotions are very complicated, right? They're not all consonant. They're often a bit about the mess in the middle, and then how we resolve that harmony is a physical thing.
Steve Pretty:
It is things about waveforms that either line up or that have some tension. It is about the manipulation of dissonance and consonance, tension versus release, and that we do this to express ourselves in particular ways and to make the listener feel particular things. So as you're listening to music, just have a think about how we might be doing that as musicians and how you might be receiving that as listeners.
Steve Pretty:
And we're going to continue that theme today talking about the manipulation of tension and release dissonance and consonance when it comes to harmony. So here is one note a middle C around that. I'm going to play a different series of notes underneath it, and that will completely change how that C feels.
Steve Pretty:
Feels like we're at home there somehow.
Steve Pretty:
Kind of near to home but in a comfortable place.
Steve Pretty:
Somewhere a bit more uncomfortable, I would say.
Steve Pretty:
But that note hasn't changed. That middle C was the same the whole time. So what's happening is we're able to change the feel of a note by moving things around it. Now, once you apply that to a whole melody, you have this amazing way of creating tension and release without changing the tune. So if we take the 12 days of listeners.
Steve Pretty:
That's the basic harmony of that. But we can do all sorts of other things with it.
Steve Pretty:
All sorts of different ways, is almost an infinite number of ways that you can manipulate the harmony underneath that main melody. But that same melody doesn't change. As an active listener, what you can do is think about how those different shifts make you feel. Tune your ears into whether it's slightly different and how it's different, and that will help you to understand the purpose of harmony.
Steve Pretty:
This is the reason we learn scales. This is the reason we learn things like chords and a guitar or piano. So it's a really, really powerful tool. Maybe it's a songwriter that you love. And when they play the verse one time, it makes you feel a particular way and then they play the verse the second time. Okay, the lyrics might be different, but maybe there's a very slight tweak to how the harmony, how the notes underneath it work to support that melody, and that little change is what will change the way you feel about it.
Steve Pretty:
So there we go. Listen like a musician.
Steve Pretty:
Let me know how it's going. I you able to listen like a musician? Do you even want to listen like a musician? I talked in my Wilton’s Music Hall show a couple of weeks ago about why I think it's important to develop your listening skills, no matter whether you consider yourself a musician or not.
Steve Pretty:
And I'll talk about that more in future episodes. But any feedback is welcome about whether you're finding those little tips useful, those ways of deepening your active listening. So to come back to Nat, I want to play the interview that I did with him back in episode ten. This was just after I met him. This was a couple of weeks after I met him, I think back in January.
Steve Pretty:
I think it was January 2024, and that year we went on to he went on to be on the podcast then, as I say. But we also I produced this, this album of songs that I talked about earlier, which you can check out again. It's called Matters of Life and Death, and I, I then had him at my Wilton show performing a couple of songs and talking a little bit.
Steve Pretty:
I'm going to play more of those later, but the other thing that I've done with that in the last couple of years is off the back of the album that asked me if I would be prepared to help him put on a live show where he was going to play some of the songs from the album, I should say.
Steve Pretty:
In the meantime, he also walked ran from Land's End to John Groats. He ran a marathon playing trombone, as you'll hear about shortly. He did all sorts of extraordinary things. He got an MBA for his work in campaigning for around cancer causes and raising money for people like Macmillan. He raised a huge amount for Macmillan and other good causes, and he was just an absolute whirlwind of incredible activity.
Steve Pretty:
Absolutely amazing. And again, sorry Nat, miss you mate, but you were an inspiration and I know you hate being called that, but it's true. So yes, he was quite an extraordinary guy. He asked me to organize this kind of fundraising concert slash gig with him, but really, in the end, I did very little. I just kind of advised on, you know, how to book things, how to structure the show.
Steve Pretty:
I helped him, I put a spreadsheet together for how we're going to structure the show, but he booked everyone. It was very much his vision, and it was due to be on the 4th of February and 2026 had just gone. And sure enough, very, very sadly, Nat died. I guess about five days before that. 5 or 6 days before that.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah. So it was an extremely difficult time for everyone, but it also left me as well as being very sad with this slightly tricky thing of producing a show that was Nat’s show without Nat there, and the whole show was raising money for Macmillan Cancer Support. And anyway, long story short, the show went ahead. It was quite an extraordinary bill, very mixed bill.
Steve Pretty:
Whatever you think of, particularly the politicians, it was quite an extraordinary evening. We had Wes Streeting there, who for non-UK listeners is in the current labor cabinet and at the time of recording is not currently prime minister but certainly has prime ministerial ambitions. And we had Ashley Dalton, who's done some incredible work as an MP campaigning for the cancer bill that has just in the Commons right now.
Steve Pretty:
And we had Dawn Butler, who is also a cancer survivor and MP, and that was very clear that he wanted everyone on the bill to be a cancer survivor. So we put on this night where everyone there was kind of survivor, all of those MPs. But we also had brilliant comedians. We had Rhod Gilbert, who has mercifully survived cancer, and we had Matt Forde, who is a wonderful political comedian and satirist who was going to be interviewing the politicians and so on.
Steve Pretty:
Anyway, in the end, the show went ahead, of course, very, very sadly, without Nat, Matt Forde took over and interviewed the politicians and did some hosting, and I sort of introduced it and, and, and and closed it at the end. We also had the Ladies Fighting Breast Cancer Choir, who were brilliant and did a couple of lovely performances, all at Kings Place.
Steve Pretty:
So it was it was a very emotional evening one way or another. And it's the reason this podcast is late, is because I had to kind of drop everything and scramble to produce this show in that memory of the first thing I did, of course, was speak to the family and check they wanted to go ahead. But Nat was ever the consummate professional performer and would definitely wanted the show to go on.
Steve Pretty:
In fact, you know, we had it confirmed when when that was very ill last few days of his life that he definitely wanted to show to go ahead. So yes, it was a very, very special evening. We also had Babel Brass Band, which was a band he played in. We did a little procession out in the kind of New Orleans style, which was, I think, very moving.
Steve Pretty:
And so it was quite a difficult night for everyone, quite an exhausting night for me, but a very positive night. All in all. And yeah, so that's one of the reasons I'm dedicating this episode to Nat is that I've been been working a lot on that show, and on kind of securing his legacy for the future. Yeah, so forgive the indulgence, but I'm sure you'll agree that Nat is an extraordinary guy.
Steve Pretty:
And so I'm going to replay that interview that I did with him back from episode ten about his upcoming at the time trombone marathon and about what music meant to him, particularly towards the end of his life after his diagnosis. So here's Nat, this is recorded back in, I think, January 2024.
Steve Pretty:
My name is Nathaniel Di and I'm a musician. That's kind of why I'm here. Yeah, I'm also a music teacher, ultramarathon runner, and unfortunately, I also have stage four bowel cancer, and I was diagnosed in autumn of 2022. Yeah, essentially I'm dying, so. Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's been an interesting year or so.
Nathaniel Dye:
Yeah. Well, I thank you so much for talking to me. I, we, we did a gig together this time last week, so we playing with the band, I will be talking about a bit more on the show and it's about to become really fun. Big band music video from just walking from can you go something that's fun and but you gave a speech at the end because we've met, I think maybe a one gig before, but didn't know each other before it, obviously.
Nathaniel Dye:
But then then you gave that speech at the MTV audience in January in Kings Cross in London
Nathaniel Dye:
about your situation because you're raising money, right?
Steve Pretty:
Yeah. So I decided with
Steve Pretty:
joy and passions and music and running and with a really good cause to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support, I decided to go for running the London Marathon, which is going to be in April whilst playing the trombone. Yeah, that generally gets that kind of reaction. Yeah, I. I've in fact inquired with Guinness to see if it could be a world record, but they won't recognize it for some reason.
Steve Pretty:
Maybe. Maybe because you could, I don't know, do a honk at the beginning and just run with it the whole time.
Nathaniel Dye:
Yeah. Yeah. But your own brand of drinking the Guinness, they're trying to sort of get him inside.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. It's got to be the zero because I got liver cancer, so I probably should have, you know. Yeah. So I've decided to challenge myself with that apart from just running whilst playing. So if you donate to my fundraiser, which you can fund for bowel cancer bucket list dot com, then you can choose a song from me after learn and and play whilst I'm running the London Marathon.
Nathaniel Dye:
It's absolutely. I mean, I can't imagine running America the best kind of marathon problem, isn't it. You can't imagine running marathons and you've done it.
Nathaniel Dye:
I mean, I do a bit running, you know, like 15, 20 minutes. And that's plenty for me, but nothing to stop. Stuff like let alone buying a bus and let alone with it.
Nathaniel Dye:
I mean, it's like absolutely insane challenge.
Steve Pretty:
Well, it feels inside at the moment, especially because unfortunately, I'm now going for chemo again. So I have various side effects, which means I get about maybe two runs in three weeks cycle. So I'm just hoping I'll have a bit of a break by April in order to to just do it. But I mean, people kind of say, well, if you can do it, that would be great.
Steve Pretty:
But for me, that's not good enough, right? I'm going to get to the start line. Whatever. And it's got quite a generous kind of community feel time of 8 hours, I believe. So if I need to just make it into some kind of march rather than run, that's going to happen. It's just. However, how have you got to finish?
Steve Pretty:
I mean, it's similar with with the Ultras as well, because I've got 400 miles to my name, the most recent of which.
Nathaniel Dye:
Was.
Steve Pretty:
Well, four times 100 miles, you know. So the most recent of those was
Steve Pretty:
when I set up a challenge of running from Harwich in Essex. And there's a there's a trial called the Essex Way that goes out to Epping just outside of London. And then London is about another 20 miles or 100 miles. And that was with all that's going on on a colostomy.
Steve Pretty:
And yeah, so I've definitely got the endurance. Let's just see if I've got the path was running, had a little bit of a go. I mean uphill is a bit difficult, but, but I don't know. It's going to be just the best atmosphere. Yeah. And I've got a boy music crew who make the plastic trombones, the pavone. They've kindly sent me an instrument.
Steve Pretty:
I'm going to strap a speaker and to my waist belt and play some backing tracks. So hopefully I'm not just on my own and I'm kind of scared of some of the repertoire that I'm going to give given really, I've had some quite bonkers stuff like Mars from the Planets, which is in five four and running whilst hearing that there's a Tchaikovsky Waltz, which is in five four as well.
Steve Pretty:
But I think very, very long, slow stuff is going to be the enemy potentially. So just having to hold.
Nathaniel Dye:
Notes even on a gig is long, slow stuff getting to be right, let alone running a marathon.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah, so I'm not sure which is going to be worse. The the lips or the lungs or the feet because I'm it can take me 8 hours, but I haven't really played for 8 hours ever or that's on its own, you know, how long do we end up playing brass instruments for?
Nathaniel Dye:
Maybe a couple of hours tops in the studio, maybe, you know, sometimes six, 8 hours with breaks and not running them off at the same time.
Steve Pretty:
Well, after this last Q I did the shout out. I got a really, really generous suggestion which came of a donation, which was half 5 minutes off.
Nathaniel Dye:
For.
Steve Pretty:
5 minutes of silence.
Nathaniel Dye:
33 Is that that's what you need to do. The John Cage beats per minute, seven 3 seconds.
Steve Pretty:
Absolutely. Absolutely. And a big part of that is just the incidental noises that happen in the audience in this item space.
Nathaniel Dye:
So sorry for clarity for people listening. You don't know that is it's a piece by John Cage, which has no notes in it. It's not not silent, but it's all about listening to what the incidental noise in space is, as you said. So yeah, they got it for 33% of.
Steve Pretty:
What I would go, maybe I get 27 bonus seconds, I don't know. But yeah, that was that was pretty cool. So I've got at least one little period of respite.
Nathaniel Dye:
That's great. But just coming into the music because when we were talking out of the gate last week, you talking about it because you've really I mean, what your background. What is your background?
Steve Pretty:
Well, I'm a classically trained musician and I became a music teacher every night straight away. And I'm a primary school music teacher. Pretty successful, actually. Our primary school won a national award recently, just as just as things are going pretty badly for me personally, the professional life was hotting up like, so it's okay. Took a music school group to have a whole series of proms, so there are all sorts of really, really good experiences and we watch.
Steve Pretty:
I'm really proud of one thing that a lot of people just think I'm bonkers for doing, which is after a lot of cancer treatment, I had chemotherapy, then emergency surgery because I got about obstruction and then I just started pretty much as soon as my body would let me to go back into the classroom and people were looking at me and thinking, What on earth are you doing back here?
Steve Pretty:
You could you could take early retirement, you could go to a beach somewhere. I remember one musician telling me, What are you doing here on this gig? You could be anywhere else but here. You could be on them. You could be on a beach sunning yourself, just having the most comfortable life. But here I am. I just choosing to make music.
Steve Pretty:
Choosing to make music with kids. And it it took having all of that ripped away from me, I think, to really realize how amazingly rewarding and special being a musician and being a teacher is and how I think it's this poppy sounds a bit more profound than it is, but it's the best use of the time I've got left.
Steve Pretty:
I don't know. I don't know why, but I just feel like I, I need to still make that contribution even though I don't have to. You know, it's very strange.
Nathaniel Dye:
But I think isn't that isn't that just an extension of why we all do it? You know, Because I think that the idea that you become a musician for the money is obviously if you do not do those straight, sort of get very noisy in the spotlight. But but so in a sense, we all do out of a sense of location and passion and drive to to because it's something we believe in and we believe in the communicative power of music to touch people and all those things.
Nathaniel Dye:
And obviously for you that has been accelerated
Nathaniel Dye:
but I guess it makes you focus on even more your heritage.
Steve Pretty:
I think music now makes me myself fit in a different way. Like so many musical experiences, just mean a little bit more. And I one of the first things I did when I was diagnosed and trying to process it all was I started writing a song just like a man, a piano, a kind of tear jerker ballad type thing about about ringing the bell that you get to ring when you're cancer free.
Steve Pretty:
And it just helped me kind of be a bit resolute about it all. I'm saying like, look, whatever happens, whatever I have to go through, whatever, how I'm still going to keep going. Because just having this moment in my head of of of bringing this bell that I have to walk past in hospital every day, I'm just going to hang on to that.
Steve Pretty:
And unfortunately, sense.
Nathaniel Dye:
Good timing with that.
Steve Pretty:
Day. None.
Steve Pretty:
unfortunately, since I wrote that song, I won't be ringing any bells now. It's that the cancer is officially classed as, you know, a spread spread so far that any treatment is now palliative, essentially. So they're just looking to contain whatever's there. But I still kind of sing that to myself, just to to provide a bit of comfort.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah. And then a few other songs have started to just come into my head and, you know, various songs in various stages of half finished in us. You know how it is with, you know, I guess this is a concept album, like a cancer concept album now that might eventually see the light of day. Who knows? But yeah, creativity is really strange.
Steve Pretty:
So I want I've had various bits of trauma in my life and at one point I thought, Right, okay, this tragedy has happened to me. I'm going to be really creative now. I'll be I'll have all sorts of things to write about, to sing about. And this is going to just produce this amazing creative spark. And the opposite happens.
Steve Pretty:
I just had no nothing in me. It was just it was too much for me to do any creating. But I don't know. I mean, recently it's just produced some really good music. So maybe both things are true. Maybe tragedy produces great music and it's okay for it not to.
Nathaniel Dye:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, if you do, I mean, I think it's you. People deal with things in different ways and music and creativity is, I guess, one way of one way of dealing with things that can be really effective. But it's not it's not always a cure. Sometimes you need to space and time to process things before you're able to be creative.
Nathaniel Dye:
I imagine.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah, I, I don't know. It's it's a case of I'm off the chemo now. I could potentially spend even if it's 10 minutes a day of the piano, just working out the songs that are kind of in my head and putting them into fruition. But somehow that's not happening. Yeah, I mean, who knows? Who knows how to become productive?
Steve Pretty:
I mean, we have all sorts of ways. Maybe I need a deadline or something, so that sounds pretty morbid. Kind of. I'm not sure. What can I say the word deadline anymore without that having connotations.
Nathaniel Dye:
I think you have the right more than the right to say whatever you like in that context, I think.
Steve Pretty:
But yeah, the humor's become really dark now, I'm sure, you know, in all sorts of ways. So yeah, I say stuff like that and I think that's it. That's very funny.
Nathaniel Dye:
Yeah.
Steve Pretty:
But yeah, there are all sorts of things just happen now. I've got, I've got a song about, you know, just raising awareness and just making a little bit frivolous. I've got, I've attempted to make a kind of joke song, which is like a blues about my stoma, which a colostomy bag which I've named Homer, essentially, because it's going to rhyme in a song.
Steve Pretty:
I thought I was taking an opportunity not to. And so Homer's song has like a solo from Homer because maybe this is slightly pure oil. I must have met, but like, Homer has like a kind of solo in the middle because this just happens to me. I'm surprised it hasn't happened on this recording, just making lots of light noises because I can't control this now, but I haven't really got a way to make it happen in the middle ever.
Steve Pretty:
So I just pass my lips off like a brass mouthpiece or something.
Nathaniel Dye:
Speaking of which, the fantastic trombone player is playing the gig last week and they're about to play again, and I might have to try and record some of the gig tonight because.
Nathaniel Dye:
I'm interested from the point of view, I think we talk about the creativity of writing songs and things, but also from the point of view of like practicing your industry and maintaining because I talked about on the podcast in the past, the difficulty of maintaining your chops as a prospect, your abilities and your muscle musculature to play the instrument at a high level is not easy at the best of
Nathaniel Dye:
times, and on our face it can be hard to find the motivation. But we just talk briefly about like about that side of things and the trombone playing and and because yeah, you're sending up some fantastic last week and and you said you've been singing with Western Australia and
Nathaniel Dye:
you really throw yourself into it to that side of things as well. It's a kind of, you know, that musical life.
Nathaniel Dye:
you were just talking about like your trombone playing specifically, I guess, and what that means that being a being a player as well as being somebody write What about your situation means.
Steve Pretty:
What's really interesting that you, you call me a fantastic trombone player because I've got the biggest sense of imposters syndrome.
Nathaniel Dye:
Well, honestly, that's something we all share. I think we all most musicians feel like, I'm not really just in that sense of it. But yeah, I'm from my point of view, that to me is great.
Steve Pretty:
But I think it happens especially to teachers who are also musicians.
Nathaniel Dye:
Yeah, I suppose that's.
Steve Pretty:
True because you think, you know, I'm just I'm just not there, you know? Was the best way in the world. When you're a teacher, you generally can't practice as much. Yeah, playing gigs in the evening and then having to get up at 5:00 to get lessons ready, etc. They don't go well together. If I was really weird since I've been like on sick leave for chemo, I've been doing way more playing.
Steve Pretty:
I had done otherwise. Right, right, right. But I do as much as I can to maintain it. I there are various things that just get in the way like, well, of course, I mean, with with with chemo treatment starting up with, with chemo I get the side effect called peripheral neuropathy, which is like intense pins and needles and hands, feet and throats.
Steve Pretty:
And it means I can't really touch brass instruments for a little bit, you know, and it wears off through the cycle. But I find the I, I generally just do what I can. Yeah. So I do a little bit of playing here and there. I mean, especially, I mean if, if as a gig, as a rehearsal, you know, I won't put my hand up for lead trombone, I fed or something so I don't have to necessarily.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go for it and like exhaust my lips.
Steve Pretty:
But I one thing I've really noticed from from from the last year or so is that I mean having cancer doesn't necessarily get you a yes to asking for stuff, but it definitely gets people listening. So I found my way into all sorts of absolutely fantastic opportunities. As a musician, I've just worked my way into all sorts of groups, started playing with a band called Babel Bros, played off a bit with a ska punk band called Filthy Militia.
Steve Pretty:
That's just because I kind of heard there might be an opening and just was brave enough to say, Yeah, can I do that?
Nathaniel Dye:
And would you would you have done that before? You said, No.
Steve Pretty:
Probably not, because I wouldn't have been confident enough that I'd be good for it. But but now, in all sorts of aspects of not just music but life, I think at this point I might as well have a go like.
Nathaniel Dye:
I mean, I hate to I hate to say so obviously artistic and try and, you know, try and reduce things down. So kind of easy, easy soundbites. But is that something that was then something that we should all take, take a lesson from? Right. In terms of I mean, obviously, we're in this very awkward situation. By the way, I hadn't said I'm really terribly sorry for your situation.
Nathaniel Dye:
It's really
Nathaniel Dye:
awful. I've been trying to,
Nathaniel Dye:
keep it light, but it's.
Unknown
Really sort of the vice president, so you have to go through that.
Nathaniel Dye:
But equally, I have to talk about it now. But I had to I've made efforts for several years ago, and now I'm a little closer to that than you might think. I mean, you know, for you, it's is much more known than it is for most people day to day. But,
Nathaniel Dye:
it's a cliche, but if you get knocked down by by somebody home today.
Nathaniel Dye:
So in terms of in terms of taking those opportunities when that when they've all been kind of going for things, if you're feeling a bit nervous or feeling a bit of the imposter syndrome and stuff, is that would you say there's something I don't put words in your mouth, but would you say that we've got something that we can of?
Steve Pretty:
Well, I don't know. Maybe I'm making this overly simplistic as well, but there are times where I thank God knowing that I'm dying soon, That's that's a bit of a gift. It means I can just go for stuff and I don't have to worry about feeling validly worth it. Yeah, because at least I'm doing something. Yeah, I. You know, I might not deserve to be here, but.
Steve Pretty:
Well, I'm here, so I might as well take the opportunities that are there. And I do all sorts of things like I've, I've written about. I'm getting on for 10,000 words now in national newspapers and magazines, all sorts of things. Just because I started telling my story and I came into it and I people, if I want my my piece in the paper and it's just snowballed.
Nathaniel Dye:
For me.
Steve Pretty:
That so it's just, just, just to take these chances you may as well. And, and in some ways as well, the pressure's off like I don't have to worry about career development. Yeah it's, I, but I've got a big long thing actually about how toxic off that is. And actually, you know, part of that was spurred on by the fact that I'm probably not going to be here for the next one that my school has.
Steve Pretty:
Right. Right. It I can just the teaching bit can just be the joyous parts I take. I take all the joy and I don't have to worry about all the all the rubbish that surrounds it. Of course, personally anyway, obviously I'll do what's required for the kids, all sorts of aspects. I can just live with a kind of freedom that just wouldn't have been there.
Steve Pretty:
I, I, I have nothing to prove now to anyone on. Yeah. When you've, when you've run 100 miles with cancer, you think, God, what else do I have to prove? I've made a statement. Now I've come back to work, I've made statements about living as well as I possibly can. Obviously, I'll continue to do that. But in some ways, I mean, obviously this is absolutely rubbish.
Steve Pretty:
I'd rather not have cancer. Don't get me wrong. I once had I think it was me in the Big C podcast on the BBC. I never say, well, I'm not certain and I necessarily go back. It's part of me now. And I think finally I get that. At the time I really wasn't happy with that statement. But God, it's in some ways it's brought opportunities, it's brought joy that wouldn't have otherwise been there.
Steve Pretty:
So and so some people keep telling me I've lived more life in the last year than I might have lived in the next 40 anyway.
Nathaniel Dye:
But I mean, it's obviously and this is, again, a very overused statement, but it was obviously very, very influenced firing. And it but I also just go back to what I was saying just now, which is that all of us, as life is unpredictable and again, you know, whether it's being in a band or not on my bus or being, you know, having a diagnosis or whatever it might be, we all know knows most everything.
Nathaniel Dye:
And so for me, the one of the wonderful things about music and when I thought about it last week, it is something we are passionate about. I think as a listener, as a player, as you know, it's so musically curious. This is an amazing adventure, and I think that's what was really inspiring to a few now and a the last week was just embracing that adventure for for its own sake.
Nathaniel Dye:
And of course, all the amazing writing within that quote. So I think it was really yeah, it's really I'm going to say again, it's really fun, you know. And so thanks very much for that.
Steve Pretty:
yeah, thanks for having me. And yeah, if anyone's interested in my story, go to bowel cancer bucket list dot com and that's got all sorts of stuff, a few press somewhat some whatever, but most importantly links to the red button fund raiser which is about seven and a half grand at the moment.
Nathaniel Dye:
Congratulations.
Steve Pretty:
That's great.
Nathaniel Dye:
Yeah. Thanks so much. That's really, really great. We're going to go play some music together.
Steve Pretty:
Yeah, it's been great fun.
Steve Pretty:
Just appreciate it.
Nathaniel Dye:
A great.
Steve Pretty:
So quite poignant listening back to that interview, just not getting excited about that trombone marathon that he had coming up and then walking to Land's End to John O'Groats and all the other extraordinary things that he did in the last couple of years of his life. I'm going to wrap up the episode now. And so thank you very, very much for listening.
Steve Pretty:
I'm going to play the episode out with a couple of tracks from from that, the first of which is a song called inspiration, which we did on his album. And if you're watching this on Spotify or YouTube, you can see a kind of slideshow of some pictures that his family and friends sent me that were taken the last few years of his life, when he was raising all sorts of incredible money for Macmillan cancer and various other organizations with his Bowel Cancer Bucket List page, which you can still donate to right now.
Steve Pretty:
So I urge you to do so in lieu of any other plugs this episode, I urge you to go to Macmillan Cancer or to Bowel Cancer Bowel Cancer Bucket List and donate anything you can afford to do. But I will leave you with the song inspiration. And then the very final song is the song that we closed my Wilton’s Music Hall show that Nat appeared at with back in November 2024.
Steve Pretty:
It's an old folk song and I think you will get the meaning for it. And by the way, if you are watching this, as I said to the live audience the other day, you will see a member, well, the basis for Pink Floyd, Guy Pratt, who is going to be a future interviewee in the show. I interviewed him back at that Wilton show that Nat did.
Steve Pretty:
He is fiddling with his base because he couldn't get it to work during that that song. And I think that is something that clearly has a dark sense of humor, and I think he would have appreciated the fact that at his gig and now talking to you. There is a video of Nazi and a very moving song. While a member of Pink Floyd tries to get his bass guitar to work behind him in quite distracting and entertaining way.
Steve Pretty:
Anyway, we very much miss you, Nathaniel. And yes, I will speak to you everyone in a couple of weeks. Stay musically curious.
Steve Pretty:
Today I feel okay, almost like a normal passer. But I've been to head and back. And one thing is for certain, it's hard for me to say this, but if I die, can not deny. That I deserve a healthy summer ground. With as your skies. And it seems I have some license now, free of life's constraint to do whatever comes to me.
Steve Pretty:
Until this reverie fades. Summers straight to winter. And then it will be time to return to the suffering that will always be mine. So now is when I look ahead and try to find a way to be this big. I like to see one day I by a brave, courageous, heroic human being.
Steve Pretty:
Just living a little more. The bad days left unseen. I cannot wave as quickly as so recently I could. A shadow of my former self. But it's misunderstood that simply keeping going really isn't special, even if some days it's not easy. But what they say is really true. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and then another.
Steve Pretty:
So if you talk to.
Steve Pretty:
Won't you tell me? Go on with me. Away from me, dear. To something special.
Steve Pretty:
Where you take my hand. As we strive towards tomorrow. Land a place, a baton in your hand. For you to take the path you dream of. And is fine in spite of you. Please just think what you can do. If a life that's yours to live.
Steve Pretty:
And what I did and gone. Remember this song.
Steve Pretty:
And live. Really live.
Steve Pretty:
For me.
Steve Pretty:
Hvor. Hvem er vi? Rd right? Her er spant Tinn gull Company. Er det bare. That there done? Hahah, How bed vant to not bad me, but sensetfart anto hu meg lavt der. You should regan dine shit. Notatsand liste and saft lek ord Gud nei tent joy be with you all er Amin may drink jan not be drunk Aman me Fidjadstill Beslan amme me kaldt.
Steve Pretty:
Her vet vi lite. Jeg har se et slep of whey from inn bud sensed her sov der bind bare time to meg er det time to. Far kam fill to me the path ing glass Gud night and join be with you all.
Nathaniel Dye:
Kura for the sun yield time in the sun you time masing Voodoo Mam.