Several years ago, the Princess of Wales decided, out of nowhere, to turn her Together at Christmas event into her own little piano recital. It was weird, especially since it wasn’t like Kate actually performed within the early December event. Her piano recital was spliced into the television broadcast and made to look like she was one of the performers in front of the audience at Westminster Abbey. The reaction to Kate’s keen recital was mixed, to say the least. She didn’t do it again, until this year. The silver lining is that Kate isn’t pretending that she performed in the middle of the caroling service this time. Additionally, she brought Charlotte along. So it was a mother-daughter piano recital. Unfortunately, they didn’t use that gold piano.
Love and connection through music 💕
A special duet playing Holm Sound by Erland Cooper to open this year’s ‘Together at Christmas’ Carol Service.
Watch Royal Carols: Together at Christmas on ITVX now. pic.twitter.com/XhWyfBTvC1
— The Prince and Princess of Wales (@KensingtonRoyal) December 24, 2025
Something nice: I like the piece of music? It’s “Holm Sound,” by Erland Cooper. It’s pretty. I would have preferred to just listen to the music rather than Kate’s voiceover. In case Kate’s Christmas message sounds familiar, it was published in early December. She didn’t even write something new for the actual broadcast – her vibe is “as I said before, stop being sentimental at Christmas!!” Which is such a bizarre message. The actual quote is: “At its heart, Christmas speaks of love taking full bloom in the simplest, most human ways. Not in sentimental or grand gestures, but gentle ones, a moment of listening, a word of comfort, a friendly conversation, a helping hand.” As I said back weeks ago, Christmas actually IS the time for sentimentality and grand gestures.
Photos courtesy of Andrew Parsons/Kensington Palace/Avalon.
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- 17/12/2025, Windsor, UK. The Princess of Wales and Princess Charlotte play Erland Cooper’s Holm Sound at Windsor Castle, as featured in the Together at Christmas Carol Service.,Image: 1061506395, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: © Kensington Palace. This image is free for use but may only be used for news or editorial reporting purposes. This image must NOT be used for any commercial or other use, save for news or editorial reporting and cannot be altered or amended in any manner or form whatsoever. All rights reserved., Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Parsons/Kensington Palace/Avalon
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- 17/12/2025, Windsor, UK. The Princess of Wales and Princess Charlotte play Erland Cooper’s Holm Sound at Windsor Castle, as featured in the Together at Christmas Carol Service.,Image: 1061506403, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: © Kensington Palace. This image is free for use but may only be used for news or editorial reporting purposes. This image must NOT be used for any commercial or other use, save for news or editorial reporting and cannot be altered or amended in any manner or form whatsoever. All rights reserved., Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Parsons/Kensington Palace/Avalon
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- 17/12/2025, Windsor, UK. The Princess of Wales and Princess Charlotte play Erland Cooper’s Holm Sound at Windsor Castle, as featured in the Together at Christmas Carol Service.,Image: 1061506408, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: © Kensington Palace. This image is free for use but may only be used for news or editorial reporting purposes. This image must NOT be used for any commercial or other use, save for news or editorial reporting and cannot be altered or amended in any manne, Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Parsons/Kensington Palace/Avalon
Keens fake posh accent drowned out piano playing. They hit a few keys i doubt they actually played. They trot out thise kids to entertain which is not a good thing.
omg that accent is so over-the-top. She sounds ridiculous.
Kate needs to tell her people to add subtitles (closed caption) to her monologues as she’s a bit difficult to understand in places. Or is it the fact that she’s droning on in ‘eat, pray, love’ speak that makes my ears want to turn off? Add the subtitles please?
And playing a duet with your daughter in front of the nation for Christmas isn’t a grand gesture?
Haha nope.
LOL. Maybe if they had done it live during the concert it would be considered grand. Pre-recorded apparently isn’t too grand of a gesture.
Kate doesn’t have the ability to play piano live which contradicts the rota who coo over her skills. Actual children do live piano recitals from pretty early on which Kate is unable to do.
Play the piano live or don’t play at all. Boo. Whew, I’m in a mood, lol. There were festive decorations though! Would have enjoyed more with just the music and less of the voice over.
And that space is supposed to be simple and small? Lmao.
I think as a kid, I would rather be in the cathedral during the whole performance with lots of people around. This setting is kinda spooky.
It isn’t a normal upbringing, the only children you get on these shows are the really talented who want to do it for a living.
Everything about her dumb event is “grand,” including the special piano in a special setting and her wardrobe and jewelry, which probably cost a mint. These people are truly idiots, and she and her lazy husband sure are starting to put those kids to work.
It was of course pre recorded.
I like the piece too. But they each played with one hand, Kate with her left hand and Charlotte with her right. At that age, I was playing two-handed duets with my father and my daughter at that age played two-handed duets with me (hello, Marche Militaire). This isn’t some exceptional display of talent, moreover it seems heavily produced for tone and syncopation. Yay Kate?
At Kate’s age?
I’m guessing that your comments are focusing on Kate’s age and skills — and not on those of the kid, who likely had much less choice when it came to either picking the piece or deciding to perform.
Yes, my remarks are for Kate. I doubt Charlotte had much choice in being trotted out to make Mum look good. And if Kate isn’t up to two-handed playing, then Charlotte won’t be allowed to do it either.
I suspect Charlotte could have played the piece herself since it was not complex, but Kate had to insert herself and pretend she can play piano with any skill.
I’ve played since I was six and agree — Charlotte probably does know how to play and Kate doesn’t. Charlotte had her hand arched the right way to avoid damage from playing, whereas Kate’s was splayed flat.
It’s kind of the perfect metaphor for this particular group of Wales. They can’t even be bothered to work hard enough to play piano with both hands.
K looks like a stock model for a Waitrose ad.
😂😂😂
I believe the parents love their children. However, with Kate’s big fake smiles and quite an ordinary prestation, I just can’t shake the feeling the the young princes and princess are no more than puppets fed to the press.
I thought the keens wanted normal lives for the kids. The kids are put in the spotlight even expected to entertain. Keen should not have made the Christmas concert all about her when she took over the concert. Those who do the actual work should be showcased
The Keens know that the public is very unhappy with them right now so they have to bring out their puppets oops I mean children out for some good PR. The more they make the public unhappy the more the children will be used!
Just a few days ago people were commenting that it’s “about time” 12-year old George took on royal duties. Today everyone is screaming about how they use their children. Which is it?
That’s funny I don’t remember people saying it was about time for George to be out working. I remember people saying what a coincidence that Peg brought George out to a charity because his brother Harry brought his children to a charity . That’s what I remember.
@ Susan Collins – your answer to Mac is correct, that’s what I remember too, Mac may be slightly confused, understandably, as there was a lot of toing and froing with that debate.
@Mac, this isn’t a royal duty, whatever they are. This is a promotion for Kate with a Christmas background. Bring the kids in and/or throw in the word cancer and it all becomes protected from all criticism.
@Mac what many of us have said on here is that there is a time and place for the children – especially George – to
Learn their public roles, to get adjusted to the spotlight etc. We’ve pointed out that other European monarchies have figured out how to do this in age appropriate ways.
But the issue is that W&K don’t seem to care about their children learning their roles. Theyre teaching their children that their lives of privileged (with no service to go along with it) and they use their children as PR to distract from their own failings.
Remember this when they tell you they want the children protected from publicity and they just want them to be “normal.” Performing a televised duet with the composer present to give advice between takes is not normal. Being trotted out to raise ratings for Mummy’s ripoff of Carols from Kings carols service isn’t normal. Exposing your daughter to weeks of press scrutiny of her clothes hair hands accessories piano playing and lessons and instruction for ratings for your concert isn’t “normal.” Forcing children to greet obsessed strangers, huh them, take their gifts, take selfies with them – none of it is normal. William and Kate constantly use their children.
Exactly so. The kids do no live a normal life and they are used as shields to protect the parents when it is convenient for them.
Diana and Charles did not use Harry and William in public events to this degree.
I guess the gold piano would have been too much of a grand gesture for Christmas. That’s bc they save the grand gestures for the Easter gifts.
More fakery this time using your own daughter.
Would be more believable if either of them showed any passion for playing or enjoying music the rest of the year.
Hyping this up as a “piano recital” really annoys me, all the more so because there is so much more that Kate could be doing in her position. The classical music scene in the UK is in a parlous state. Music teaching, especially instrumental tuition, is becoming increasingly rare in state schools. Many freelance musicians’ careers have barely recovered from the effect of the pandemic and the post-Brexit trading agreements on their ability to tour. Someone needs to be promoting the importance of music, especially within the education system, and publicising schemes to support up-and-coming performers. The late Duchess of Kent did that through her Future Talent charity, so what are the odds of Kate taking on her namesake’s patronage?
Excellent suggestion, Maremotrice, what’s to stop KM picking up the baton and wholeheartedly supporting the late Duchess’s Future Talent organisation ?
It would be an easy duty for KM.
The Duchess of Kent was by all accounts a more talented amateur musician than Princess Kate; she narrowly missed out on a place at a conservatoire and sang in London’s Bach Choir for many years (which required her to be regularly re-auditioned). Check out this radio interview with her, originally broadcast on Christmas Eve 1989: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p009mdbm
Yet even she knew better than to make her musical patronages about pretending to be something she wasn’t (i.e. a concert pianist).
Private Eye said that in terms of their causes, the wales have no interest in “culture” so do with that what you will. It won’t be them.
Thank you @Maremotrice, I only knew a little of that about the late Duchess – what a lovely person – humble, modest and most of all so genuine. She would have been too kind to say what she thought of KM and the bogus Middleton Christmas Special piano scene.
The voice over has me doubting if the music was them actually playing or just a recording.
I could only stand to listen to about 15 seconds of the voiceover, but it reminded me of her seasonal schlock…perhaps this can stand in for the “Winter” video? But silly me, we shouldn’t expect to be graced with that until March at the earliest.
I know! At l east with her season videos we can mute the sound. I rather liked the music, I just didn’t want to have to listen to Kate blather on over it.
The music seemed heavily over-produced. No doubt they brought in the best piano in London, but the sound was just to perfect-perfect. Having techs heavily edit the soundtrack would be on brand for Kate.
Notice the covered up power-supply line in the last pic?
It’s a Steinway Spirio, where you can let the piano “play” a pre-recorded piece.
https://www.steinway.com/spirio#
Hence I highly doubt there was much input by either Kate or Charlotte.
@ Nanea, that’s hilarious – didn’t even notice that so thanks for pointing it out. Pretending to play a beautiful piano piece tracks with Kate’s M.O. which involves her expecting us to believe a lot of faked photos and faked hair to say the least.
It’s completely fake, in other words? A programmed piano that plays the music for you. Wow. I’m surprised how brazen it is.
Wow, thanks for that info, Nanea! This really is brazen.
Nice spotting @Nanea
@Nanea – thank you for pointing this out. It’s so outrageous that it made me laugh out loud. Imagine if either one of them had somehow fallen off the piano stool but that piano just carried on playing!
No wonder it had to be shown as a pre-recorded video and not played live.
I would have loved to just listen to the piano music. Kate’s Christmas message is for me just meaningless word salad and distracted from the music.
My takeaway from this, and all I’ve seen is the publicity, is that there is something seriously wrong with KM.
And for goodness sake, stop with the waist-length fake hair.
Weird handplacement in the first pic.
I saw that too. My daughters are the same age and I don’t think you could catch a picture of me holding them that way. She’s too old to be in danger of falling off the piano bench. It’s clearly a pose they picked, and a weird one.
All I have to say about this is when do we get breathless reporting on the ratings for this special? Are they going to put it against other Christmas specials? Or are they going to put it against prime time movies and Christmas specials of popular television shows?
When do we get to hear that they are failures and no one is interested in them? And ask why ITV continues to show this each year with these dismal returns? When do we get to critique why William wasn’t in the background when they were playing, or how come we didn’t see George or Louis? Do I get to know how much Kate and Charlotte’s clothes cost? How about their jewelry? How about the cost of maintaining in Windsor Castle?
And, most importantly… how many bathrooms are in their palaces and “forever homes?”
So are the children now “working royals”? Because they are sure being used by their parents often enough to qualify. I wonder when they reach their teens if they will have larger engagement numbers than their parents and more headlines in the tabloids also. None of this seems genuine just another performance for the audience in Montecito imo.
I agree. but the audience in Montecito isn’t even watching. They’re doing their Christmas thing which sounds way more fun than “Charlotte, come pretend to play the piano with me so your cousins that we don’t talk about will be so jealous of what a good and loving mum I am.”
Well, it was certainly pre-recorded (before or after the carols service? Who knows? ). They needed something, anything to boost Kate’s numbers and this might have done the trick…they also needed something to distract from their abysmal work numbers…there’s nothing genuine about them…
Who’s willing to bet that writing the message in early December and reading it counted as two separate working events for Kate? 😊
I count at least five, if not more: 1) writing (mumbling notes to someone to write down), 2) editing (yelling at that person that it’s not right, you meant this other word thingy), 3) recording (x however many sessions it took to get it right), 4) reviewing recording (x same), 5) final approval. IT’S HARD WORK, Y’ALL.
They’re laying the groundwork to present Charlotte as a “professional-level concert pianist!” just like Kate is supposedly a “Top CEO” and “professional photographer.” I’m just so sick of that entire family.
schools have concerts featuring students. But Charlotte being pushed out as a “prodigy” is a bit much and puts too much pressure on the child. Maybe Charlotte will have more focus than her mother as she grows up. And actually be serious about learning something and not dabbling. The children are typecast. George is predicted by media to be a great future King . But Louis is “cheeky” .
It would have been enough if Charlotte and her classmates participated in a school concert. Rather than pushing Charlotte into the limelight. Kate is just a dabbler.
The “performance” was taped, so at least Charlotte didn’t have to perform in front of a live audience AND cameras. I think Charlotte is able to play, and surely Kate can do all play with just one hand. She may be more capable than her mother.
The media are really pushing (implicitly and explicitly) the idea that WanK’s kids are perfect, never put a wrong and definitely superior to their cousins in California. It’s truly vile.
Charlotte, at 10, seems to be be quite a natural at this royal stuff.
Hopefully after she gets her education, she will have a real work ethic which royals need now.
Hopefully after she gets her education she’ll be allowed to nope out of the whole clown show if she wants to.
I couldn’t listen to that voice over, she sounds so fake.
Her foolish “stance” on Christmas not being a time for grand gestures and sentimentality is just a weak jab at Meghan and WLM. She’ll always be in Meghan’s shadow.
So Kate Middleton is teaching her daughter that they lie to public and pretend they are playing a mother/daughter duet. Lovely values they are teaching their children!
This. She is also teaching Charlotte that a modicum of effort will result in outsized praise by the British tabloid Press. No incentive to actually work in the service of others. None of the “impactful” work the Waleses profess to perform. Rather like George showing up for a short while at a homeless shelter and being lauded as “Generous George” by the DM (with no mention of Archie and Lilibet having done likewise just a short while earlier!)
This is so cringe. Poor Charlotte. I feel sorry for any child used by a parent as a prop.
They are not playing ..as pointed out on so many of the comments above , which is again instilling the wrong values in those children . Faking it and on Christmas ? What is stopping them from doing it live ? Or getting some gifted kid to actually do a turn..there must be so many who play instruments and sing . My grandson, same age as Charlotte can play by ear and at five could play Ode to Joy at his class concert . But no Charlotte has to be front and center with her dishonest mother, pretending to play . And oh lord someone shut up Kate next time
I’m just glad for Charlotte’s sake that they pre-record and don’t make her perform for the audience.
Her voice is like nails on a chalk board. And it’s very obviously not her natural voice or accent. That whole video was just cringe.