After a decade and a half as a London-based freelance cellist, Patrick Tapio Johnson has retrained and has just commenced his first role as a software engineer with General Assembly. He hopes this will enable him to provide real, meaningful help to people, while solving some cool problems in the process.

QUOTES

“After the pandemic, things changed overnight. The pandemic wasn’t the catalyst but it was a nudge.”

“Amongst musicians, many had their heads in the sand and were reluctant to take advantage of it (the pandemic).”

“I was performing for a lot of people, and searching for a sense of purpose and relevance. In a lot of cases, musicians were not considering how to monetise their skills.”

“There were reactions to what was going on but few that seemed constructive.”

“Writing code was making me feel more creative than anything I had done in years.”

“In tech, there’s a willingness to take people on based on what you think they’re capable of.”

“When I had a son, it was a moment in life that I started thinking beyond what the next gig would be. I wondered how I could run both careers in parallel.”

LINKS

• Patrick Tapio Johnson
• Musical Orbit

IMAGE CREDIT

Kaupo Kikkas

PODCAST TEAM

Production Support from Molly Jenkins 

Audio Engineering from Frazer Ruddick

Theme Music Composed by Danna Yun

Theme Music Performed by Jasper Ly

RECORDED

Recorded on 26 July 2021