The area where I grew up in Birmingham was very diverse - I was aware of my race but not overly aware of it - and there seemed to be an understanding that we were all very much in the same boat.

I grew up in Birmingham, but my parents are originally from Barbados. My dad, Romeo, was a long-distance lorry driver, and my mother, Mayleen, worked in catering.

I grew up in the Midlands area of England around the Birmingham area and when I was four years old, my uncle, who was living in the same house that I was living in, had as a hobby, playing the ukulele. At four years old, I was interested in this instrument already and he taught me a few chords on it. So that is how I started on string instruments.

I'm very fortunate. I loved school and, when I went there, race, gangs and violence were not issues. There was a feeling, gone now, that you had to be presentable. If you hadn't combed your hair, older black ladies - complete strangers - would come up to you in the street and pull out a comb and straighten your tie.

I grew up in Birmingham, where they made useful things and made them well.

Birmingham people are the salt of the earth, and I've carried that with me all around the world. People respond to a certain down-to-earthness that I have, and that's purely as a result of coming from Birmingham.