'Home At Christmas': Waterford man's charity single for Parkinson's Ireland amid personal diagnosis

A Waterford man living with early-onset Parkinson's has composed and released a charity single in support of Parkinson's Ireland, despite the condition affecting his ability to play guitar, piano and sing as he used to.

John Kelly was diagnosed with early-onset Parkinson's in 2022, he told this reporter, at just 44 years of age, and although he hasn't needed much from Parkinson's Ireland yet, he wanted to raise awareness and funds for the charity while he still could.

John was always a fan of music, and of playing both piano and guitar, but along with his diagnosis four years ago, he lost much of his musical abilities.

Playing the piano is "next to impossible", he said, as well as playing the guitar or using a keyboard.

"And there's other aspects of it too. When I hear myself back on videos, I notice that I stutter and stumble a little bit and I see the tremors and so on, whereas, four, five, six years ago, I wouldn't have displayed any of those types of symptoms."

His condition first manifested itself when John was working and he realised he was making more and more mistakes typing emails and working on the computer.

This later turned to tremors and numbness in both his right arm and leg, which led to John seeing his doctor and getting a Parkinson's diagnosis.

Despite this, John composed his first single 'Home At Christmas', together with his friend of 30 years Monica, who has been a part of the process since the beginning.

Over a cup of coffee in a little cafe in Tallow, Monica suggested a charity single might be something interesting for John to do, and after working on the lyrics this summer the pair approached Waterford singer Glenn Murphy about taking the singing role.

Glenn, John said, was delighted to take part in the single and has been fantastic throughout the project's journey.

Another local man who has helped to make the single possible, John said, is Paul Grant, who allowed John and Glenn to use his studio in Slieverue for the single and has been extremely helpful with his knowledge of the process, all of his equipment, and with his time.

Although John has loved playing music his whole life and was "one time a reasonably decent musician", he had never considered releasing music before.

"I would have been the guy that people cast their eye at, or got to come up and play a song at a wedding, or play a song at a 21st or 50th or something," he said, adding that if he was to release a song he needed to do it "sometime soon, because as a progressive condition, it's only going to get worse for me in terms of movement."

"It's further than I've ever gone before in terms of releasing anything. So I'm quite proud of that."

The song is "a story of friendship, resilience and community support" and John's experience offers a more personal perspective on living with a condition like Parkinson's and how the support of friends, family and music can help in difficult times.

Although the song doesn't mention Parkinson's directly, John said he felt it implies a situation where the singer relies on the help of their partner to get through the day and through Christmas in an upbeat way.

From the beginning, the single has been about raising money for Parkinson's Ireland, whose events John has taken part in many times in recent years.

There's a number of Parkinson's charities, locally and nationally, which John considered as a recipient, but as the most high-profile and established group he felt that supporting the national charity would ensure the funds raised would be well spent, as well as being well deserved.

Because of this, John also set up an iDonate page for the song, where funds will again go directly to Parkinson's Ireland but can be attached to the song.

The single is available on all major streaming platforms, like Spotifytarget="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">, Apple Music and Amazon Music, and can be found under both singer Glenn Murphy's name and composer John Kelly's.