Natalie MacMaster

Celtic music will always be around, even if with the mainstream crowds it dies out.

When you return to the same area a few times, you get that frequent rapport with the public and the fans of the music along with having a certain warmth when you walk onstage.

I love jazz and pop rock and country. I grew up listening to Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Def Leppard, AC/DC, Anne Murray - if I hear something really great... I want to be a part of it.

As a young child my attention span was, as I remember it, rather short.

The thing about Paris, it's a great city for wandering around and buying shoes and nursing a cafe au lait for hours on end and pretending you're Baudelaire. But it's not a city where you can work.

I studied international relations and economics at the University of Virginia. I paid my way by working as a bartender in the summer and at three part-time jobs during the year.