“That’s nothing to be proud of,” he insists. “Someday I really want to learn to read. In the meantime I can still have fun playing the piano and teaching others how to do it without resorting to note reading.”

Laughlin was born in San Francisco to show business parents, mother a big band singer and father a stage magician. He grew up in Oakland and earned a degree in anthropology from the University of California at Berkeley (class of 1969). Finding little demand for anthropologists in the job market, he tried his hand at piano lessons again.

He began studying with legendary western swing pianist Floyd Domino at the age of 23. (Domino was just 19 and playing with an up and coming band called Asleep at the Wheel). And that’s when Laughlin discovered you don’t have to be a note reader to have fun playing piano. Or even to make your living doing it.

Another thing Laughlin learned from Domino is that it’s feasible (and usually necessary) to bring your own piano to gigs. Within a few years he was doing his own gigs at night and worked in a music store by day where he learned to move pianos correctly.

Armed with a piano dolly and an Econoline van, he too was soon dragging his Baldwin Acrosonic from gig to gig. Today Laughlin uses an electronic piano when he plays in public, but he still takes his Acrosonic on camping trips (really).

In the late 70’s he devised and taught an eight week piano course for California State University in Chico. Soon thereafter he attended an evening seminar at the same university and got the idea for making his course a one day seminar. What made it feasible was that he provides each student a special prerecorded CD or cassette tape for on-going practicing.

One seminar in one college eventually grew to three seminars in 80 different locations and a very hectic traveling schedule. Meanwhile he was learning as much as he could about pop piano playing and traveling even greater distances to take lessons.

His first love is New Orleans flavored rhythm and blues piano as performed by the likes of Professor Longhair, James Booker, and Dr. John. Laughlin has traveled to New Orleans extensively to study the art and has had direct coaching from Dr. John and noted singer/songwriter Allen Toussaint among others.

Among his many performing credits include performances either with or for Sawyer Brown and Sylvia (country); the Ventures, Fabian, Wolfman Jack (rock); and Bobby McFerrin (jazz).

Laughlin is proud to have taught over 1,600 live in person workshops and helped over 25,000 adult students fulfill their dreams of being to play piano for fun and personal enjoyment. You can read some of the hundreds of testimonials here.

Today he lives with his wife in Rio Vista, California. He comes out of retirement because he misses teaching and with the help of the Internet and technology, he wants to bring his Instant Piano Workshop online so he can share his method with as many people as possible.

His outside interests include snow skiing and scuba diving. Wife Pam (a musician in her own right) and daughter Emily are certified divers as well.