Sheku Kanneh-Mason

Music that changed me

- Interview by Amanda Holloway

Now 23, Sheku Kanneh-Mason first drew widespread attention by winning BBC Young Musician of the Year in 2016. In 2018 he played at the wedding of Prince Harry and Megan Markle, and in 2020 he was awarded an MBE for services to music. As well as solo albums, he has made recordings with his talented siblings, whose extraordinary story has been told in several TV documentaries. Sheku’s solo album, Song, comes out on Decca in September, and on 10 September he plays at the Last Night of the Proms.

I started playing the cello at six and ELGAR’s Cello Concerto was the first classical music that I fell in love with and felt I understood. Of course, my feelings towards the piece have changed as I’ve got older – performing and recording it has taken my relationship with the work to another level of connection. It’s shaped who I am as a musician. When I was younger, I listened to the Jacqueline du Pré recording constantly and I suppose I tried to copy it, but her way of playing and her interpretation are so individual that I learnt more from her approach to the music than from specific things she does with the piece.

We also grew up listening to recordings of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with Itzhak Perlman, and Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto with Vladimir Ashkenazy. My brother Braimah plays the violin, my sister Isata plays the piano, and I play the cello, so I’m sure it’s no coincidence that this was the music we were exposed to!