Laura Silverstone had a dream: that one day she would become a musician. Way before Simple Plan and Green Day smiled at her from the posters plastered on her bedroom walls, she’d already learn to play the accordion.
“Music in my day-to-day life is like drinking water, like eating. It’s the most essential part,” she says. “I play every day; I sing every day… It’s my main form of communication. It’s my reason for being.”
Silverstone picked up guitar when she was 13. Shortly after, she started posting covers to her YouTube page for friends and family to see. This quickly turned into a passion that led her to busking with a friend in the streets of Bilbao, her hometown. It was then she realised she’d have to leave home to make it.
Laura Silverstone lives in Scotland in her camper van. Credit: Laura Silverstone
Strumming Dreams: Busking and Touring
“I moved to the UK chasing the dream of pursuing music, come what may,” says Silverstone, now 28. “When I moved, I had very little money and was in a precarious situation. I took my guitar to the streets and literally played to earn a meal.”
Moving to the UK was a tough decision. Silverstone worked in a kitchen and as a carer for years before making music her main career. She also had to detach herself from her previous life and loved ones to see clear. On a phone call to Bilbao, her mum Mercedes jokes she’s “stubborn”.
“I’m okay as long as she’s happy and she’s happy with her life and her job. Would I like it if she lived closer? Yes, of course. I’d love it. But her happiness is what matters to me,” says Mercedes.
“It’d be easier if she was a doctor or a lawyer, but what can one do? She’s followed the path she desired, her dream, and it makes me happy and proud.”
Silverstone has been busking for the last ten years, based out of her van in Edinburgh and playing around Europe. She’s made a big group of friends and fellow musicians that have seen her grow.
Kevin McCann is one of them. They met during a Folk Club night in Isle of Skye. “Most of the regulars, including myself, had played already, me on fiddle. Near the end, from my left-hand side, I looked to see and hear for the first time: Laura.”
She sang Txoria Txori, a Basque song by Mikel Laboa about unrequited love. “I was moved by her warm voice and the song. I immediately took up my violin to accompany that legendary song,” he says, inviting her to join him onstage “with her huge guitar, huge eyes, huge voice, and presence”.
McCann has plenty of photos of the time they spent together: trekking, playing gigs, and climbing the mast of his boat, Fruit Cakes. Silverstone has a big smile on her face in every shot, her eyes full of hope.
From Streets to Stage: Lap Tapping in Spain’s Got Talent
Silverstone knew she’d record an album and she released her first record, The Fall of the Northern Star, in 2017. She dreamt she’d play with Springsteen and, even though she didn’t, she did get a harmonica and a hug from The Boss himself when she saw him live in Ireland in 2013.
But she never thought she’d be on TV.
Laura Silverstone performing in Spain's Got Talent. Credit: Laura Silverstone
She was coming back from Thailand, listening to a podcast where an ex-contestant talked about her experience on a TV show. She thought to herself “maybe now is the moment”. She didn’t even have time to plan – Spain’s Got Talent got in touch before she could board the flight back home.
The jury loved her so much that she ended up getting the golden buzzer, going straight to the semi-finals. “I don’t believe in destiny, but sometimes weird things happen, and I feel like the universe is listening. When things like this happen, I look up at the sky and say ‘Universe, I want a rich boyfriend’,” she laughs.
Notes of Perseverance and the Art of Busking
There have been hiccups. Silverstone says the nerve-racking experience was not all she had hoped for. She wasn’t allowed to play her own songs and didn’t win the show – she says the TV appearance hasn’t really helped her career. But she impressed one of the toughest juries with her lap tapping and powerful voice.
Silverstone also met some people that share the same dream, like Kat Almagro, who played percussion for her during her cover performance of Springsteen’s Born to Run. Now they’re working together to release her first studio album, which she crowdfunded with Kickstarter.
She talks about her experience as a journey full of stories, full of people, and full of people who’ve turned into stories. Silverstone says it allows her to keep learning every day.
Laura Silverstone busking. Credit: Laura Silverstone
“My lyrics are not more mature, but things that were new or shocking before stop being that relevant with time. So, when I tell myself ‘this is the last heartbreak song I write’, I’m lying. Things come back and you’re doomed to go through them again,” she says.
“Now I’m able to see beyond the emotions you bleed out when you’re experiencing things first-hand.”
Her dream has helped her become who she is now. Music hasn’t changed her, but it gave her the push to start a new life abroad.
“Street music and art can be different, though connected, and I'm proud to have learned and lived through it,” she says. You could say Laura Silverstone was born to run.
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