You moved to America as a student of jazz. When and why did classical performance become your focus once again?

During my time studying jazz in Boston it became clear that I had to make a choice. Both of these musical fields are so large and require 25-hour a day commitments, which is still not enough for one to succeed artistically. Despite the pleasures of creating things on the spot, and creating music that is more directly one’s own, I felt that the joy of studying the genius creations of the great composers would be more fulfilling – and so it has been.

How does your passion for jazz inform your classical performances?

Journalists always like to cite that for some reason! They say, “oh that’s jazzy”, but I’m not so sure. Understanding that music is not only coming to you from off a printed page, but that music exists anytime and anywhere, is maybe a feeling with which some conservatory students are not familiar