I’m a trainee psychotherapist and musician in the UK, and I’m deeply troubled by how hard it is for children and young people to get timely mental health support. On the weekend of Erik Satie’s birthday in May 2026, drawing on my long-standing meditation practice, I’ll play his extraordinary piano work Vexations — all 840 repetitions — in a single marathon lasting around 18-hours, to raise money for better help for young people.

I’m a trainee psychotherapist and musician, and I’m vexed.

Every week I meet adults whose struggles began in childhood. We now know that around one in five children and young people in England has a probable mental health condition, yet services are overwhelmed; many wait months or even years for support.

As someone who works with minds and with music – and who has a daily meditation practice – I want to turn that frustration into something practical, focused and, in its own quiet way, hopeful.

Please follow me on Instagram: @vexations_2026

What is Vexations?

In 1893, Erik Satie scribbled a single page of strange, chromatic piano music and added a line that has haunted musicians ever since:

“In order to play this motif 840 times in succession, it would be advisable to prepare oneself beforehand, and in the deepest silence, by serious immobilities.”

The music itself is short – just a few lines – but Satie’s inscription invites the performer into something more like a meditative discipline than a conventional concert. You repeat this tiny fragment 840 times, extremely slowly, in a state of concentrated stillness. The result is one of the longest and most enigmatic works in the piano repertoire: depending on tempo, a complete performance can last well over 16 hours.

In 1963, the composer John Cage organised the first full public performance at the Pocket Theatre in New York. A team of pianists, “The Pocket Theatre Piano Relay Team”, took it in turns to play, and it took about 18 hours and 40 minutes to reach the final repetition.

Since then, Vexations has acquired an almost mythical status. Most performances use a relay of pianists. Only a very small handful of pianists worldwide have ever attempted – let alone completed – the entire cycle solo, in marathons lasting anything from around 16 hours to well over 30 hours.

The piece is, in many ways, a kind of musical 'koan': stubbornly simple, oddly unsettling, and deeply meditative. It gradually wears down the performer’s sense of ego and 'doing', until something else begins to happen.

What I’m doing

On the weekend of 16/17 May 2026, the anniversary of Satie’s birth, I will sit at the piano and hope to complete Vexations' 840 repetitions, solo. The performance will take place in OPEN Ealing, with a 1921 Bechstein grand piano graciously donated by a former student of mine, Paul Leverett, who runs Piano Restorations Ltd. The image above is created by AI, but uses the space itself as the backdrop.

There may be a couple of special guest appearances by prominent pianists, who can take on a small number of repetitions for me as I have two hourly 10-minutes breaks. That's still in the planning phase.

I expect it to take around 18 hours. It will be a serious physical and mental challenge:

...staying focused and accurate through the small hours

...living with this obsessive little fragment as it repeats again and again

...managing tiredness, pain, emotion, and the temptation simply to stop

My preparation is not just technical. Satie’s advice – to prepare “in the deepest silence, by serious immobilities” – reads very much like an instruction for meditation. Over the months leading up to the performance, I’ll be deepening my sitting practice alongside my piano work: cultivating stillness, attention, and a willingness to let thoughts and feelings come and go without clinging.

Already, in practice sessions, I’ve noticed something interesting: after a couple of hours, the usual sense of “I am playing this piece” starts to dissolve. It can feel more as though the piece is playing me – as if Vexations is using my hands and body as its instrument. To stay with that experience, I have to let go of the usual performer’s ego: no showing off, no 'big moments', just a steady, attentive presence.

That is the spirit in which I want to play this marathon: as a long, shared meditation on endurance, attention and care – dedicated to children and young people who are having to endure far more than they should.

This performance is my way of saying: we see you, we are taking this seriously, and we are prepared to stay the course too.

How you can take part: sponsor a repetition

I’d love you to “adopt” one or more repetitions of Vexations.

Here’s how it will work:

There are 840 repetitions in total.

You choose how many repetitions you’d like to sponsor – perhaps a meaningful number (a birthday, an anniversary, a year), or a block (say 10 or 50)

After you donate, you’ll be invited to tell me which repetition numbers you’d like to 'own' (for example, 1–10, or 327, or 501–520). I'll update a spreadsheet daily with what's currently available.

After the performance, you’ll receive a signed, numbered print of 'your' repetition(s) – a copy of the score marked with its unique repetition number, signed and dedicated.

Your page in the music will be a small, tangible piece of this very large act – a little relic of a long meditation.

If you’re able to attend in person for part of the performance, you might even choose to sit quietly during your repetitions, treating that time as your own meditation or reflection.

What to give?

For the sake of transparency and accessibility, I’m suggesting:

£10 per repetition as a guide amount

£5 minimum per repetition, if that suits you better

Or whatever you can genuinely afford – larger gifts are, of course, deeply appreciated.

If all 840 repetitions were sponsored at £10 each, we’d raise £8,400 (before Gift Aid).

If you’d like to underwrite a larger block – for example 50 or 100 repetitions – please do. You might choose to dedicate them to a particular school, service or group of young people.

Other ways to support

If sponsoring specific repetitions isn’t for you, you can still help enormously by:

Making a one-off donation of any size

Sharing this page widely with friends, family, colleagues and on social media

Coming for part of the performance (if you’re local) and simply being present. Sitting quietly, listening, drifting in and out – it all matters.

Why this matters

Behind the statistics are real children and young people whose distress is often invisible until it’s overwhelming. Services are doing their best with limited resources, but the need is rising faster than the capacity to respond, and waiting times for specialist support remain stubbornly long.

By supporting this project, you’re not just funding 'more therapy'. You’re:

...shortening agonising waiting times

...helping families get support earlier

...investing in the long-term mental health of the next generation

As a psychotherapist, I spend my days sitting with people in difficulty, trying to offer the kind of steady, non-judgemental attention that allows something to shift. As a meditator, I know how transformative it can be simply to stay with experience, breath by breath, even when it’s uncomfortable. And as a musician, I’m drawn to pieces like Vexations that invite us to listen beneath the surface.

On the day itself, every hour at the piano will be dedicated to the children and young people who are holding on, waiting to be heard. I’ll be bringing my training as a therapist, my discipline as a meditator, and my craft as a musician to this one long stretch of listening.

Thank you for reading, and for anything you feel able to give.

YoungMinds is the UK's leading charity championing the wellbeing and mental health of children and young people. Driven by their experience, YoungMinds creates change so that children and young people can cope with life's adversities, find help when needed and succeed in life.