For this week's Musical Monday (see Diane's blog), I chose a live recording of Nightwish's "The Siren" from the End of an Era tour- a stunning performance. Tuomas Holopainen (keys, lyrics, composition) is by far my biggest source of musical inspiration to date. If it were not for him and my discovery of Nightwish, I probably would not have bought my first keyboard and taught myself to play, at least, not as soon as I did. His lyrics have inspired much of my own writing, past and present. And Tarja, the ex-vocalist featured in this video, would not have been a sort of role model when I was first developing my voice. Tuomas, and Nightwish as a whole, gave me something to aspire to. I owe that man a lot of credit, not just as a source of inspiration, but also for (indirectly) helping me to keep my sanity when times were less than ideal.