Royal Albert Hall For YouTube Sensation

A pianist who has been watched performing more than 43 million times on YouTube is making her debut at the Royal Albert Hall next month.

Valentina Lisitsa is a Ukraine-born musician who started playing the piano at the age of three and then played her first solo recital aged four.

"I could not have done this without all my online fans around the world," she said. "Their reactions tell me every day that I am doing the right thing and that's the best reward for my hard work.

"Now I want to say thank you and give them a great concert live and online. Basically it's a gathering for friends old and new. It's a concert, but it's also a celebration.

"There's a lady from Barbados coming, and even people from New Zealand."

The venue's chief operating officer Jasper Hope described Lisitsa as "a force of nature".

He said: "I don't know anybody else who has done this before and we simply had to open our doors to her and give her this opportunity on the world's most famous stage."

She is not the first performer to take advantage of online success.

Teen sensation Justin Bieber famously became a star after videos of him singing were put online by his mother.