N
icola Benedetti started play-
ing the violin when she was
four. Since she was 16 she has
been performing up to 100
concerts a year. She even cut
short her higher education
because music was her priority. Now,
aged 34, she has a fresh mission in her
life: to find a new work-life balance.
“I’ve been reading a lot of the philoso-
phers of the Scottish Enlightenment
and the recurring theme is a question
of balance,” she says. “We all have to
pick our own path through this.”
She aims to get the concerts down to
about 60 or 70 a year, but this isn’t hap-
pening yet. She is at the Aldeburgh Fes-
tival throughout June and this monthgives three performances, including
the Scottish premiere of the violin con-
certo that Mark Simpson wrote for her.
“I’m in unknown territory at the
moment. I have huge personal chal-
lenges ahead of me and there’s no one
other than me that can come up with
the right answer.”
One problem is her charisma. Beau-
tiful and fabulously gifted, she is much
in demand, not just to play music but to
teach and talk about it. She has been
appointed the first female — and,
bizarrely, first Scottish — director of the
Edinburgh International Festival (EIF).
The EIF is another way of spreading the
word or, rather, the note.
“I think it was definitely a sense ofCLASSICAL
‘WE ALL HAVE TO
PICK OUR PATH’
She has been playing the violin since she was four. Now Nicola
Benedetti wants a better work/life balance — the only problem
is she’s never been more in demand. By Bryan Appleyard
duty to culture, music and to Scotland
that interested me in the first place. I’ve
forever been looking for ways to impact
the largest number of people possible
with the things that I believe, and our
responsibility to a civilised society.
Nothing really presents the kind of
opportunity that being able to make an
impact on a festival of this size does.”
Does she have the business nous to
do this? “I think I have that gene. I had
a period of time when I was shadowing
my dad in the business world. On top of
that there’s the mission and the drive
behind the inception of the Benedetti
Foundation.” The foundation provides
education around the world, while her
Italian dad, Giovanni, ran dry-cleaning
shops and invented a dispenser that
solved the problems of clingfilm. He
made £21 million when he sold it in- So she understands business.
Yet something else looms to make
her plans more complex. Stephanie,
her elder sister who is also a violinist,
has two children and Nicola is crazy
about them.
“It’s actually shocking the amount of
love you have for a nephew and niece.
I said to my sister, ‘You know, it’s weird.
I’ve known you my whole life, but I
miss them more than I miss you.’”
This brings us to another “huge per-
sonal challenge”. She had a long-term
partner, the cellist Leonard Elschen-
broich, but that relationship ended and
her private life went dark. It had to. Her
looks and fame earned her stalkers.
One threatened suicide when he found
out she had a boyfriend and another
was so fierce that she had to get a
restraining order. Like many stars, she
has to live behind an opaque screen.
But — and this she seldom admits —
she now has a partner and clearly
Stephanie’s children have made her
broody. She tentatively admits that she
wants to have children — “Erm, if I am
fortunate enough to be able to, yes I
hope so.” She laughs and becomes edgy
about personal chat — “No more com-
ment. Let’s leave it there.”
So I swerve into more solemn mat-
ters. What does she think we should do
about the Russians? The great conduc-
tor Valery Gergiev resigned from his
job as president of the EIF because he’s
a pal and public supporter of Putin.
What would she do? With touchingDo I think
Russianmusicians
should bebanned?
Absolutelynot
String theory
Benedetti at
Wellington
School in Ayr, in
1994, aged sevenFRANZ GALO. INSET: KENNETH FERGUSON/PHOTOSCOT8 22 May 2022