You’ll be performing the Bruch Violin Concerto in Australia. Can you remember when you first came across it, and how has your relationship to it changed?

Yes, I was 10 when I learnt it for the first time as it’s one of the concertos you do learn when you’re young. Not because it’s easy but because it’s a perfect example of Romantic music and when you’re little you just love this kind of music. It’s a perfect piece. My relationship to it is always changing, even from performance to performance – it’s never the same. It also depends with whom you play, which orchestra and conductor. All of these things can influence how you play it on a particular night.

Is there a special challenge in playing a piece that’s so well-known and popular?

I never try to make myself sound radical or stand out on purpose, which is the temptation with such a piece. It has to be realised in the moment, because every time I do it, it’s different, even when I have a general rehearsal in the morning and the performance that same evening. At the end of the day it’s...