Lewis Capaldi began his music career by singing ‘Live Forever’ by Oasis at a school talent show when he was 11.
The ‘Someone You Loved’ hitmaker met his friend Aidan Beattie - who now plays bass in his band - when he was in Primary 7 in school in Scotland, and after hitting it off during guitar club after school, the pair decided to tackle the Oasis classic at their school’s talent competition.
Recalling the start of his friendship with Aidan in his YouTube Originals documentary ‘Birthday Song’ - which details his childhood, and his quest to play a cover of ‘Setting Sun’ by The Chemical Brothers and Noel Gallagher, which was number one in the charts when he was born - Lewis said: “I remember there was a guitar club in Primary 7, and the teacher was Mrs Weatherston, who was substituting for Mrs Mooney. There’d be about eight or 10 of us, and I thought I was class.
“It gets to [my turn to play] and I thought, ‘Yes, you guys are all s**t.’ And then the bass player in my band now - a guy called Aidan Beattie - played ‘Live Forever’ by Oasis and sang at the same time. And I was like, ‘B*****d, I wanna know how to do that.’ ”
And Aidan then added: “That was one of the first songs I’d actually learnt all the chords [to] and learnt how to sing. And then that’s sort of where the idea came about for me and Lewis to enter into the talent show.”
Once their friendship was forged, Aidan taught Lewis how to play the song, and the pair went on to win the talent show.
Lewis said: “We sang ‘Live Forever’ together, and we won the f****r. It was lovely.”
And one of his school teachers, Mrs. Mooney, recalled: “Everybody loved it. The two boys sat in front of the stage and just played away. It was actually quite emotional, quite overwhelming.”
The 23-year-old chart-topper credits the moment with kickstarting his music career, as ‘Live Forever’ was the first song he learned to play guitar to and sing at the same time.
He said: “That’s the first song I think I learned to play and sing at the same time.”
Lewis’ YouTube Originals documentary, ‘Birthday Song’, is available to watch on YouTube.
