As a young girl I broke my arm at my very first roller-disco, and my Dad who was a doctor bought me a small piano accordion as physiotherapy. I developed a huge love of traditional music, and spent several years touring festivals and folk clubs around the country and beyond. In 2003 I was the winner of a BBC Fame Academy Bursary, which I used to fund an album called ‘Box on’. This led to a nomination at the BBC Folk Awards for best newcomer. After gaining a PGCE in Primary education I spent several years as a music specialist teaching curriculum music in primary schools across Sunderland in the North East. Seeking a new challenge I sidestepped into teaching secondary music, which is where I am today!

I loved playing music as a child, and I was hugely fortunate to have some brilliant teachers, and to be able to play with some great youth orchestras which gave me amazing experiences around the world.

After a career as a lawyer, I chose to take a leap and follow my love of music. As well as running Melodic Decoder, I teach piano to children between the ages of 4 and 11. I am passionate about finding creative ways to introduce children to the fundamentals of music which will hopefully lead them to a life-long love of playing. You can find some of the activities I use in my “Fun Ways To…” blog.

My daughter loves a good puzzle. She also loves a good detective story. So when she started learning piano and had to get to grips with reading music, I knew the best way to get her interested would be to disguise the learning as detective puzzles - and so Amadeus Wolfgang was born!

I enjoyed coming up with new puzzles so much that I wanted to turn it into a business. Shona came on board to join in the project, both as a wonderful music teacher and an amazing musician. Shona and I have known each other for years, and it is a pleasure to be working with such a talented and all-round lovely person!

We really hope you enjoy our books, and that they help to find the joy of music-making which Shona and I were both lucky to have in our childhood and now on into adulthood.

Written by Alison