One of the SMC violinists, Amelia Jones, sent us her report of the recent visit by Nicola Benedetti:
“In the morning, we were all gathered in the hall awaiting her entrance. When she finally appeared, she was greeted with loud applause.
When she played, I think I can speak for everyone when I say that we thought she was amazing. She played two pieces, one was long and wistful, the second was fast and exciting. The second was a piece which is designed for one violin player to play all the different lines on just the one instrument and as a violin player, I know is incredibly difficult. She then answered some questions where she revealed that she practices five hours each day!
In the second session, it was just the violins and she got us to really think about our technique and how we can improve.In the last session, we had to sight-read the new THYO piece. Nicola played it as if she’d played it for ages already.
To conclude, it was a really inspiring day and proved to us that if you enjoy something enough, and work hard at it, it’s possible to succeed.”
It was fantastic to watch the open rehearsal and see how easily Nicola engaged the students. She had a natural rapport with them and was friendly and approachable. Great to hear words like ‘amazing’ and ‘inspirational’ coming out of the students’ mouths afterwords. Amelia sums it up beautifully with her final comment – hard work yields results and you can have fun along the way!