Over the coronavirus lockdown, Princess Kate began practicing the piano, the instrument she played as a child, and since then, she has played on televised holiday specials and even made a surprise guest appearance behind a Windsor Castle grand in a video for Eurovision. It turns out that the princess also sang and appeared in musicals as a child, as a resurfaced video shows.
A video of Kate in costume as Eliza Doolittle and singing “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” from My Fair Lady dates back to 1994 when she was 11 years old attending St Andrews School in Berkshire, according to Capital FM. The video circulated on social media in both 2014 and 2019, but it has added resonance now that Kate is embracing her identity as a musician anew.
In her book Kate: The Future Queen, Vanity Fair’s Katie Nicholl reported that Kate and her younger sister, Pippa Matthews, both played flute and piano at school and took extra piano lessons at home. Their teacher, Daniel Nichols, said that he remembers Kate as a “really delightful person to teach.” Kate also sang in the school choir in St. Andrews and also appeared in plays and musicals like My Fair Lady.
Kate returned to the school in 2012 to open a new athletics field. “I absolutely loved my time here,” she said in a speech during her visit. “They were some of my happiest years.”
On a February visit to Cornwall with Prince William, Kate ran into Jim Embury, one of the history teachers during her time at the school. “I do recognize you. I remember the classroom and everything,” Kate told him. “I’m trying to teach my daughter all the things you probably taught me.”
In her time as a royal, we haven’t gotten to see Kate sing solo, and during the holiday specials, she left the singing to the professionals. In 2022, she humorously explained her decision to stick to the instrument. “On the piano you can slightly hide away a bit more than you can do singing,” she said, according to The Mirror. “Actually my children probably wouldn’t forgive me—I’m not sure whether they think I’ve got a particularly good singing voice. I’ll have to have some lessons.”
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Erin Vanderhoof
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