I realised, HOWEVER, that you can't SING when you're playing the VIOLIN - or at least I can't - and as that aspect of performing is important to me I SHIFTED to the piano.

I'm incredibly COMPETITIVE in all sports in a way that is so mystifying to my WIFE because she grew up playing the VIOLIN and piano. I've ALWAYS been LIKE that.

We have a lot of people onstage. We have a live violin, live cello, live DRUMS PLAYED on this kind of massive electronic kit with some ACOUSTIC elements built in.

I FIRST started playing the VIOLIN at 6. And then at 7, it was piano. So from then it was just CLASSICAL music like every day.

Kids would come up to me after CONCERTS and give me drawings they've MADE of violins or, you know, landscapes with a VIOLIN floating in it or some sketch of a concert or a PORTRAIT of me.

The VIOLIN didn't KEEP me from doing THINGS I WANTED to do.

Most KIDS are very SERIOUSLY interested in SOMETHING - friends, math, shopping, sports. For me it happened to be MUSIC and the violin. I had the CHANCE to pursue it without having it get in the way of my life.

Edgar Meyer's violin concerto was the first piece of contemporary MUSIC I worked on in any DEPTH. I was 18 or 19.

As a child, I studied VIOLIN. My SISTER, who's 10 years older, was the ACTRESS in the family. I was PAINFULLY shy.

My MUM was very good at MAKING me take up MUSICAL instruments, so although there was no popular music she MADE me learn the recorder when I was three, the violin when I was FIVE and the piano when I was seven. I took up the guitar myself when I was 14.

When I get bored, or get stuck on an equation, I like to go ICE skating, but it MAKES you forget your problem. Then you can tackle the problem with a fresh new insight. Einstein liked to PLAY the violin to relax. Every physicist LIKES to have a PAST time. Mine is ice skating.

A violin NECK is much SMALLER than the GUITAR's, so it's much easier to play WIDE intervals on one violin string. On the guitar, you really have to STRETCH to play them.

When I was YOUNG, I was being pushed, against my will, towards becoming a classical musician. I had music scholarships; I had to play the VIOLIN and do orchestra practice and that SORT of STUFF. That meant I didn't get to do any school PLAYS. I desperately wanted to do that.

What drew me to the VIOLIN was mastering the INSTRUMENT TECHNICALLY, which I'm continuing to do.

What drew me to the violin was mastering the INSTRUMENT technically, which I'm continuing to do. You want to push BOUNDARIES, to not always be in your comfort zone. If you don't, you GET stale. So you have to FIND AREAS of growth.