I was lucky enough to have parents who started me on music very early, but most kids don't get that kind of exposure.

I never had any real expectations about what sort of success I would have or all the publicity.

I like trying things, I am kind of adventurous and I like thrill seeking.

Actors want to do Shakespeare again and again, or want to do Hamlet. When you hear one guy do Hamlet and another guy do it, it's going to be a whole different experience.

I don't sleep with a violin in my bed, but there is something very magical about the instrument. You open up the case; it's a masterpiece, it's gorgeous, the varnish is still there from 300 years ago. People who know violins, they look at it and it's almost like a face.

We live in the least ugly time in history. If you look at back when Beethoven was writing, half the kids were dying, mothers were dying at childbirth, there were more wars going on then than there are now. People wrote the most beautiful things during the ugliest times.

Although I hardly ever turn on the TV set unless it's football season, I do watch a lot of TV on my iPad - perfect for long airplane journeys.