Birth:

I was born on the 4th day of the 4th month in the 4th year of the new millenium - on April 4, 2003 (took me a while to get to terms with the 3 :) - making me an Aries and Gen Z. Fate (or my unconscious desire to come into the world at the right time and place) decided that my birth should be on the same day my mother arrived for the first time in Berlin, Germany - the emigration destination of my parents and other family members after having lived their entire lives in Odesa, Ukraine. Another notable thing is that my non-musician grandmother proclaimed after I was born that I had the hands of a pianist - whatever she meant by that at the time. 

The name I was given has a religious connotation - Daniel is a biblical name and can be translated as "God is my judge" in Hebrew and Popov is a common surname in Eastern Europe, derived from the root word "pop" (similar to "pope") which is the name of a priest from the Eastern Orthodox Church. While my parents and I are not strictly religious and the name choice was intuitive, the relationship with the divine and many of the shared religious and spiritual values remain very close to me - although with clear exceptions.

Family:

My parents were both born in the Soviet Union in 1975 and grew up in Odesa, the port city of Ukraine on the Black Sea where they went to school, got married and already worked in similar industries in which they would later progress in Germany. My mother was a professionally trained gymnast in her youth and later became a certified yoga teacher in Germany. My father was in the Odesa State Marine and became a chief engineer working on cargo ships under the German flag which by now has taken him around the whole world. This is why I after my parents divorced when I was young, I was already used to not see him very often as he was away every few months for work even though he still supported me greatly. My parents both remarried and as I lived with my mother, I had an additional parental figure with my German stepfather who works in street and forest maintenance.

My origin is mostly a mix of Ukrainian and Russian as well as a German bloodline which allowed my family who mostly lived in Odesa until the 2000s to emigrate to Germany. The few family members that stayed are now spread between Ukraine and Russia and politically divided or left Ukraine as the war began. As Odesa was historically a predominantly Russian-speaking city, my family speaks only Russian which is why I unfortunately didn't learn Ukrainian in my youth and am only fluent in Russian besides German and English. Nonetheless, it is a language I am grateful to have learned to speak and read while growing up in Germany.

Even though there are no musicians in my family, there is a generally positive attitude towards art which encouraged me to pursue my interests without limitations which I consider a big privilege and was always cautious of the expenses my parents made for me, especially as an only child.

Hometown(s):

My first impressions on earth were made in Berlin and still quite often in Odesa. However in the time I can remember, since kindergarden I grew up and spent my school years in the beautiful city Potsdam - the calmer neighbor of Berlin historically known as the royal residence of Prussian king Frederick the Great with his famous Sanssouci palace, later for the Potsdam Conference after World War II and in more recent years for the film industry in Potsdam-Babelsberg. But even though the two major cities Potsdam and Berlin have always played a central role in my life, the place I was able to call my permanent home in my adolescent years is just outside of Potsdam called Bergholz-Rehbrücke (translating to “mountain wood-deer bridge”…) where the name already gives away the surrounding nature which allowed me to have countless peaceful walks in the woods and fields spanning far in all directions. In my youth, I often visited relatives in Odesa during summer holidays - last time in 2021 - and always enjoyed the simple lifestyle by the sea and felt a sense of wonder by the fact how many great classical musicians I deeply admire have grown up in this once so culturally flourishing city (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Musicians_from_Odesa). Another regular holiday destination of my parents was South Tyrol for hiking where I always felt at home in the solitude of the mountains.

So, in a way I have different layers of hometowns: 

Berlin was the big city with a vibrant music and art scene which offered me many possibilities and where I could always go to if I needed something specific like visiting concerts or my music degree. Here I also spent my first years with blurry memories of the parks and the distinct smell of air coming from the U-Bahn stations.

Potsdam offered a much more peaceful atmosphere to grow up in and still had plenty of beautiful and interesting places to explore. Whereas Bergholz-Rehbrücke was my own little space where I could truly relax in the tranquility of nature I can't live without. And if I needed to, with the connection of the Potsdam-Rehbrücke station I could get to the Potsdam city center in 15 minutes by tram as well as in 30 minutes to my university by regional train. So in a way, I had the privilege to take the best out of city and village life as I was always close to both lifestyles.

Odesa is the city I consider as my hometown outside of Germany as my family and I have the most memories here. With the war in Ukraine, it felt surreal that the country that my parents emigrated from somehow came to the country they emigrated to and it was in a twisted way also a positive experience for me. 

Since my 20th birthday I moved to Berlin next to Potsdamer Platz, Potsdamer Brücke and Potsdamer Straße which is obviously quite ironic. Another funny coincidence is that the predecessor building for the music department of my university, was in the same street I live in now. Being based here was especially useful to make the most out of the frequent classical concerts in the area as I live right next to the Berliner Philharmonie which is also not far from the Konzerthaus Berlin, Pierre Boulez Saal, Staatsoper unter den Linden and only 15 minutes by bike to get to the two main music universities in Berlin - UdK and Hanns Eisler - where you can enjoy free class concerts multiple times a week during the semester which I regularly attended.

Education:

My mother took it upon herself to learn with me all kinds of school subjects since kindergarden against my rebellious nature. What followed were easy and fulfilling years in elementary school as I was far ahead with what I had already learned and therefore spent most of my time helping struggling classmates and turning to my many hobbies at the time. I enjoyed spending time alone and involve myself in various kinds of artistic activities. My mother noticed my musical interest and brought me to a Russian lady in Potsdam who had a small kids singing ensemble which she trained and promoted in small but regular concerts. I soon became the lead singer and she urgently convinced my mother to also take piano and composition lessons with her to have a broader musical horizon. Being a passionate performer from an early age, my mother also noticed a casting for the Youth Ensemble of the well known show palace Friedrichstadt-Palast Berlin where I managed to convince the judges to get one of the few acting roles and therefore had to travel multiple times a week to Berlin after school to get professionally trained in singing, ballet/modern dance choreography and acting. When I went to the prestigious high school Helmholtz-Gymnasium Potsdam - where I was around many aspiring doctors, lawyers and generally smart people from often quite wealthy parents - I quickly fell behind. What followed was me mastering my skills to cheat my way through most of the exams and accept regular humiliations along the way. I was absent of many classes and spent most of my time immersing myself in the world of classical music I consciously fell in love with after discovering it through YouTube and which quickly became my escape plan from the academic struggles. When I realized that classical piano is the path I want to pursue further, I decided to quit all my other extracurricular activities and dedicated myself fully to the piano and soon was accepted as a junior student in Berlin which at the time was overcrowded with a highly successful upcoming pianist generation which dominated many international competitions. I was obviously greatly inspired by such a musical environment and tried to imitate them and developed my pianistic abilities mostly by myself but with regular advice from several teachers. I later understood how much I don't fit into the academic system and even though I am grateful to every person that had taught and supported me, I ultimately believe that I wasn't able to adopt any one's advice and mostly developed by listening to the recordings of musicians I was inspired by and by my own ideas which I found to be quite uncommon. Some of my pianistic journey is also chronologically documented on my YouTube as a sort of mini series of my piano development with detailed context in the description box below the videos.