Sean Ono Lennon learned to play the guitar as a way to “contact” his late father, John Lennon, and “fill the void” of his absence.

Friday 22 November 2024 at 11 a.m

Friday 22 November 2024 at 11 a.m

Sean Ono Lennon learned to play the guitar as a way to “contact” his late father, John Lennon.

The 49-year-old musician was just five years old when his father was shot dead in December 1980 and he struggled to “fill that void” without the Beatles legend until he turned to music to help process his grief.

He told People magazine: “I never played music because I was good at it. I lost my dad and I didn’t know how to fill that void.

“Learning to play his songs on the guitar was a way to process the loss with an activity that made me feel connected to him.

“When you’ve lost a parent, things like that motivate you – because you’re trying to find them.

“Making music always made me feel like I was getting to know him better.”

And Sean has also learned a lot about self-expression through his mother, artist Yoko Ono.

He said: “She showed me that art is conceptual. The essence of conceptual art is that it doesn’t matter what medium you express yourself in because it starts in your mind. That influenced me a lot.

“For better or for worse, I’ve done movies, I’ve done oil paintings, I’ve done rock records. I even did a jazz record this year.

“So, for whatever it’s worth, my philosophy about being creative comes entirely from this Yoko mentality of “art is conceptual.” The medium is secondary.

“So that’s why I have this arrogance that I think I can make movies or do whatever I want!”

Despite being so young when his father died, Sean still has very vivid memories of his father.

He said: “Going through something very traumatic when you’re a child can basically freeze the memories of that time period in your brain. For me, they’re etched in stone.”

The musician has loved digging into John’s archives for projects such as the deluxe edition of his 1973 album ‘Mind Games’, particularly because of the chats between the ‘Imagine’ singer and his musicians on the raw session tapes.

He said, “You build someone out of fragments.

“I grew up mostly knowing my dad through pictures and recordings, because he wasn’t around.

“So when I hear my dad say something that I haven’t heard before, even just for a little moment, it means so much to me. It’s like gold. It’s precious because it’s like getting more time with him.”