Inside blind and autistic 13-year-old Lucy’s journey to winning The Piano

13-year-old Lucy wowed the nation when she performed Debussy’s Arabesque on Channel 4’s The Piano on Wednesday night.

The teenager from Halifax in West Yorkshire moved viewers to tears as they watched in amazement as the blind and autistic pianist recited the piece from memory.

The performance was so moving that Lucy was crowned the winner of the show with classical pianist Lang Lang, one of the judges, calling her a “genius”.

Here we take a look at the musician’s incredible journey, from his music teacher Daniel first seeing his ability playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to performing on stage at the Royal Festival Hall.

Daniel previously spoke about Lucy’s story, with the pianist playing the keyboard for the first time when she was just two years old.

He began taking piano lessons with his teacher Daniel when he was three years old through the music charity. The Amber Trust.

He previously recalled: ‘I first met Lucy in the ball pit at school and at first I couldn’t see anyone in the room. And then I saw this little hand sticking out of the ball pit.

And someone said, “Oh, that’s Lucy.” So I put a little keyboard under the hand, and the hand started playing, rather riotously, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

‘And I thought, ‘Here’s a girl for whom music is really important.’

“And it could be a way to unlock their language, their social skills and, above all, their enjoyment of life.”

The family upgraded her keyboard and realized she was composing music in her head while sitting on the couch. She was also able to play music after listening to it just once.

“From a book of fairy tales with a piano, she started playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, but it was perfect. It was a great moment to hear that,’ recalled Lucy’s mother, Candice.

Daniel said that the lessons were not easy at first, as he had to figure out how to teach and make the most of his talent.

He said that when he started teaching, Lucy couldn’t listen to a piece for more than 10 seconds before she got impatient and moved her hands out of the way.

Now, he will play the whole piece for her before asking Lucy to recite what she remembers having.

He said, ‘You can’t teach Lucy, you can only guide her on the journey.’

They show their hands separately, with Daniel saying that he has to physically raise their hands sometimes so they can jump over each other.

The pair work together with Lucy putting her hand under Daniel’s, with Daniel still playing, pressing his fingers down gently before she tries out the piece on her own.

“He loves to improvise, he loves to play jazz and the social interaction of that,” he said.

Lucy reacts to music with her body, especially her head and leg, which Daniel said she sometimes has to hone her energy down to her fingertips.

The pianist, who was born with cancerous tumors in her eyes and is largely speechless, was entered by her mother Candice for the competition because she wanted to show others how “amazing” she was and raise awareness about her condition.

The teenager wowed passersby at Leeds train station with her rendition of Chopin’s Nocturne in B flat minor last month, and the video was viewed five million times online.

Since recording the show, hosted by Claudia Winkleman, Lucy has been learning more and more pieces from artists like Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Duke Ellington, and Stevie Wonder.

Viewers raved about the emotional performance on Twitter when the final aired on Wednesday night, with one writing: ‘Lucy on The Piano just made me an emotional mess. How amazing is she!

Another wrote: ‘Lucy, that might be the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen on TV. Well done!

A third added: “Lucy made me cry with pure joy, what an amazing young man, brilliant performance!”

One user said: The piano is a beautiful program. Blind girl Lucy’s piano playing was out of this world and deeply moving.”

Another added: “I don’t mind admitting that Lucy on the piano just made me shed a tear, not out of sadness but pure joy at such an incredible talent.”

One viewer mentioned her amazing teacher: “Let’s take a moment to give a big shout out to Lucy’s teacher – amazing.”

Judge Mika praised Lucy’s ‘amazing’ rendition of the song, saying, ‘Magic things happen to music that go against all odds and all limitations.’

The singer added: ‘It’s amazing when it happens. When it happened in Leeds, when Lucy performed, it was amazing, it was the most humiliating thing you could ever see.