Therapist turned singer Miel de Botton tells Joanna Davis what is has been like dealing with a marriage break-up, the death of her father and launching a music career which has led her to her first festival performance - Camp Bestival in Dorset.

NOT many people would find the strength to pursue a singing career in their forties after the break-up of a marriage, but Miel de Botton did just that.

Born in Zurich, once living in Paris and now London, the sister of philosopher Alain de Botton and divorced mother-of-two has entered the music industry later than most.

The Swiss contemporary art collector and philanthropist qualified as a clinical psychologist and family therapist and practised in therapy centres in and around Paris. This career would, perhaps surprisingly, come to influence her relationship with music.

Miel took the bold step of leaving her job to pursue her singing career.

The former banker's wife said: "It was a childhood dream of mine to sing but I had never considered it as a career.

"It was only when I experienced heartbreak and the singing just happened, and it seemed to happen alongside all these difficult things happening, my dad died and I was looking for some sort of freedom and self expression.

"And then I got offered the opportunity to make music."

Her first gig was five years ago for the Weizmann Institute of Science.

Miel said: "It was at the St Pancras Hotel in London. There were 300 people there. It was a real leap of faith for me but it was an amazing experience.

"I was offered a second gig in Israel. None of it has been easy for me. I have experienced nerves from the beginning.

"Maria Callas was also someone who was nervous about her singing but I have had a lady who has helped me with breathing exercises just doing 20 minutes of it at a time and that has helped a lot."

Miel's album Magnetic is a double album of French and English songs. She has just released the single Come On Baby especially for the summer.

She started out singing classic French songs.

"I said I would like to start doing something with new arrangements that make things sound very different.

"I have a reggae version of Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien on the album and a bit of ska. I'm grateful that I've been encouraged to write my own material.

"I've then got more upbeat songs on the album like Come On Baby."

Miel says she is inspired by the lyrics of Leonard Cohen and Van Morrison.

"I personally like a really broad range of music, especially disco," she says.

Her children have been 'very supportive' of her singing, she says.

"It's not their kind of music," she admits.

"My daughter is 12 and my son is 16 and he likes rap and he likes quite obscure things as well.

"But the children are very supportive and they come to my gigs, which is lovely."

Miel believes very strongly in the power of music.

She recently did a gig for Nordoff Robbins, an independent music charity which offers music therapy to adults and children.

"I believe in the power of music and I've seen what it can do.

"Every morning I do my dancing and my singing around the bedroom and I really think it's massively important."

When she was living in Paris Miel worked as a psychologist.

She said: "It's very different city to London. The feeling in Paris was that people thought much more in terms of society.

"Here in London it's much more about individual people in terms of self improvement and creation. People are more free to do that whereas in Paris it's also wonderful but they are thinking about society and sometimes that can be restrictive."

Miel describes her relationship with brother Alain, the well known philosopher, as 'very close'.

She said: "He lives in Swiss Cottage, London, so we are not very far apart. We get on very well. He has just gone off on a two week tour.

"He told me that when he first heard I was going to be a singer, he thought 'that's nice, she can sing to us over lunch'.

"But he has told me he was very impressed by my singing. He's very supportive of everything I do."

Miel's star is so much on the rise that she is fast acquiring Twitter followers - but will she acquire enough to rival her brother's 586,000 followers?

She says: "Alain is very good at telling his Twitter followers about me. He's given me a few mentions but I'm always too shy to ask!"

In the next few months Miel will start working on a new album. Songwriting has to be done when the mood takes her, she says.

"You have to catch it when it flows," she says.

"The first song I wrote was called Beautiful You. I wrote it when I was sat in a room, I sat and I wrote all the words and thoughts I was feeling and it just flowed."

I ask Miel whether she thinks it has been harder for her coming into the music industry a little later in life.

She said: "In some ways I think I'm at a disadvantage because it is generally just the young ones who are starting out.

"But in some ways I think I'm luckier because I have experienced many different things in my life and that does affect and have an influence on my music."

*Miel will be giving two performances on Sunday July 31 at Camp Bestival. She will be performing in the Travelling Barn Stage at 4.45pm and in the Caravan Serai Tent from 6.20pm. See campbestival.net for more information.