Nigel Kennedy
Nigel Kennedy
Nigel Kennedyis a British violinist and violist. He made his early career in the classical field, and has more recently performed in jazz, klezmer and other music genres...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionViolinist
Date of Birth28 December 1956
adequate assured bring declares english london orchestra somewhere until
I don't think I am going to play in London with an orchestra until I can be assured that I'm getting adequate rehearsal,"" declares Kennedy. ""And if that's never, I won't play in London with an English orchestra. I'll have to bring one in from somewhere else.
drums effects electric good great heavy involving leaving moment playing projects quite rocking useful violin
No, I'm not leaving the electric violin to Vanessa Mae. I'm still playing quite a lot of electric stuff. But only when there is a need for it. I like rocking out. And the electric violin is useful for many other things. It's useful for really good effects and it's also great for rocking out, with the drums and the bass, get into really heavy stuff. At the moment I'm not really doing any projects involving that thing.
crumble might pushing technique
If you're not pushing your own technique to its own limits with the risk that it might just crumble at any moment, then you're not really doing your job.
america classical four interest popular
The Four Seasons was making me popular in Britain, but EMI America had no interest in making that happen in the States, so I just had a classical career there.
bach direct foremost mean route studied
Yes, I mean like you know, having studied with Yehudi Menuhin that is like some direct route into Bach, because he was one of the foremost interpreters of Bach for the violin.
playing waving
Why would you want to stand there waving a stick when you could be playing an instrument?
again anybody forget ideals people reached remember risk staying true
I think it's more important that I don't forget my ideals as a true musician. Will people forget me or not is not so important to me as staying true to my ideals as a musician, that's what people made remember me in the first place. Every now and again I will have to risk that people forget me, because I will stay true to my ideals as a musician. Without those I wouldn't have reached anybody in the first place.
great perfectly sounds violin
My violin is called Kylie as she sounds great and is perfectly formed.
cat jazz cat-love
Bach was a top harmonist geezer, which is why the jazz cats love him.
mean thinking play
I can think and play stuff in classical music that possibly violinists who didn't have access to other types of music could never do. It means I'm more flexible within classical music, to be a servant to the composer.
vantage-point different brahms
Even if you're playing Brahms or a Beethoven concerto, you've got to have a different vantage point, slightly, each time.
jobs risk might
If you're playing within your capability, what's the point? If you're not pushing your own technique to its own limits with the risk that it might just crumble at any moment, then you're not really doing your job.
thinking people labels
I think Bach is equally a romantic composer because he laid the seeds harmonically for people like Chopin and the great Romantics, Brahms, so its difficult to you know all this like labelling and putting - I think Bach is attractive to musicians because he supersedes the labels.
spiritual teenager levels
Menuhin was playing Bach on a fantastic spiritual level when he was a teenager.