At 98 years old, Phillip Springer is no ordinary musician. The award-winning artist has created music recorded by 20th-century luminaries like Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra.
Despite his many achievements, Mr. Springer himself has remained relatively unknown over the years. His daughter, Tamar Springer, told The Epoch Times that he “never had the recognition his talent merited.”
‘He Was Clearly Destined to Be in Music’
Mr. Springer began playing the piano at the of age 6. Within six months, he could play Bach by ear.“He was clearly destined to be in music in some capacity, and he became a piano player,” said Ms. Springer, who currently manages the family music publishing company—Tamir Music—which owns the copyright of most of her dad’s songs.
At 17, Mr. Springer formed a professional band—that played at popular venues in New York City—before he joined the army.
While in the army, he had a very musical stay, and his experience there was a bit out of the ordinary.
“When they found out that he could play all the popular hits, they didn’t let him do his guard duty,” Ms. Springer said. “They made him stay at the piano all night.”
After the military, Mr. Springer attended Columbia University before embarking on his career. His father, a successful lawyer, desired that his son become a classical pianist instead of a songwriter.
“While my dad did become a popular songwriter, his study of the classical composers, including Beethoven, was an important part of his life because it was a way that he could connect with his father and make his father proud,” Ms. Springer said.
Mr. Springer did not stop playing the piano when he married his wife and had children.
“I grew up with a classical concert every day,” said Ms. Springer, who was born in New York and raised in California.
Mr. Springer, who enjoyed 67 years of marital bliss with his wife, still practices the piano despite suffering from neuropathy. He is very disciplined about his craft and practices the piano with a timer, several times a day.
“I can see sometimes if he feels stressed out about something, he immediately gets up and goes and plays the piano,” she said. “I think it’s his way of also just coping with whatever he’s going through.”
As the day goes by with different activities, the nonagenarian entertains his neighbors with a classical concert each night.
Playing Moonlight Sonata: ‘It Just Came Out of Him’
Mr. Springer plays a song for his daughter on her birthday every year. In 2020, on the eve of Ms. Springer’s birthday, he tapped out a heartfelt rendition of “Moonlight Sonata” by Beethoven.“He sat down, and it just came out of him,” said Ms. Springer, who recorded him on her cellphone and posted the video on her Facebook page.
After the clip was discovered by a Beethoven Facebook group, it went viral, making waves the world over, catching the attention of Dan Rather, and more.
Since the piece was posted at the height of the pandemic, Ms. Springer believes it brought “hope, heart, and humanity to the world at a time when the world needed it most.”
Today, it has made the rounds on the Internet multiple times, recently blowing up again on Instagram.
“It just continues to have life, and it just organically flew around,” Ms. Springer said. “It’s a very unique rendition. I think what touched a nerve is that it was a pure, heartfelt emotion.”
Ms. Springer has also enjoyed reading through the comments on her father’s music, all of which seemed to be free of hate.
“I saw only love,” she said. “I saw only gratitude, admiration, respect; comments about the brilliant performance.”
The popularity of the video prompted various media outlets to contact Ms. Springer, allowing her to share her father’s story with the world.
Ms. Springer is thrilled with the recognition her father has recently received.
“I admire him tremendously,” Ms. Springer said. “It means the world to me because I’ve always been a big fan of him, and now I know that the world is a big fan of him, and that, I think, makes him feel good.”
She’s clearly not the only one who admires her father’s talent. Claire Graves, the president of the association that administers The Webby Award, told Ms. Springer that she received various emails stating how deserving her father was.
Passionate about her father’s music, Ms. Springer believes he has built an incredible legacy that deserves to be celebrated.
“His journey really touches a lot of very iconic places and people during the 20th century, and I felt that that’s a small piece of music history that should be shared with the world,” she said.
Ms. Springer said it’s her “heartfelt mission” to promote her dad’s catalog of vintage music as she believes the general public isn’t aware of his achievements.
To share her father’s legacy with the world, Ms. Springer is producing a documentary, “More Than Santa Baby,” about her father’s life and career.
