He began studying at the age of ten and became the youngest member of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain at the age of twelve. He went as a boarder at Uppingham, as a music scholar at the age of thirteen and thence attended St. Paul's School in London so he could continue his cello studies with Herbert Withers. At the age of fifteen, Benjamin became a student of the Spanish cello virtuoso Gaspar Cassadó and moved to Florence and Siena, Italy for the next three years.