Máiréad Nesbitt

Began playing the piano at age four.

I don't talk about my age. It's the principle, because men are never asked their age and women are. I don't think it's got anything to do with the music. I think the most important thing for a musician is to be musical. You can do all the technical stuff from a young age, that's absolutely fine, there are so many fiddle players who can do that. God, there are thousands of us out there, but you have to have an inbuilt musicality that you can't actually learn. A lot of young players have a certain amount of expression, but they lay an awful lot of importance on virtuosity. Anyone can be virtuosic, all you have to do is practice and practice, and you will get it. You can do anything, but to have the feel, it has to be a natural thing. It has to be in you, you can't learn it. There's an awful lot of classical players who can't play anything unless they read it. I do a lot of things with different people, and I really think that's so important, because you can become so isolated and insular in yourself. You can think you're right all the time, which of course nobody is. You can think you're the most important thing, if you don't collaborate with other people and look at their perspective on things. It's always a learning experience, once you stop learning, it's over. And nobody ever stops learning. It's great to have a string of letters after my name, but I really do love playing. That's what it's all about.