Tetbury Music Festival

Elise Smith, inspired founder of the now well-established festival of music performed over a long weekend in Tetbury's beautiful parish church, threatened us in her speech before tonight's opening concert with a spelling test as we left. Not many of us would, I guess, have remembered "Myslivecek", the composer of the first piece on the programme, and hardly more "Bezuidenhout", the surname of the fortepiano soloist in two concertos, one either side of the interval.

I can't say I had much opportunity to fret about the possible quizzing, as the music proved all-absorbing. Both concertos, well-known works, sounded quite different to "normal" at the gentle hands of Bezuidenhout, accompanied by a tiny orchestra of original instruments. Time stood still in the slow movement of Mozart's K453.

It was the first of two Arcangelo concerts during this year's Festival: we look forward eagerly to Jonathan Cohen's take on the B Minor Mass on Sunday evening.

"Messiah"

Ten years ago, Martin Smith celebrated his 60th birthday by conducting his beloved Orchestra of the Age of the Enlightenment in "Messiah" in Inigo Jones' Banqueting House, Whitehall. Last night, he did it again, this time in Christopher Wren's Sheldonian Theatre, to mark his 70th birthday. And with the same tenor and bass soloists - all four in fact Cambridge alumni. (Where is the home-grown talent?!)

The banked seating last night gave the opportunity to witness the degree of close eye contact between for instance Nicholas Kraemer at the harpsichord, the first cellist and Maggie Faultless, the leader. While these performances may spoil one for "Messiah" when rendered by lesser players and singers, they certainly bring out new things. "Comfort ye...", the first words we heard, were sung by Mark Padmore with all the intensity required to remind us of Shaw saying that the text was a work of genius: "a meditation of our Lord as Messiah in Christian thought and belief". Tim Mead wrenched the heart similarly with "A man of sorrows...", and then there was the angelic Katherine Watson (only 26, and a big star looming). Gerald Finley's "The trumpet shall sound" stole the show in the London performance, and did so again last evening. In the intervening decade, he has added Hans Sachs to his repertoire: I thought I detected even a bar or two from "Die Meistersinger" in his oh-so-free final section: brilliant!

Martin looked shattered at the end: I do hope he is not already feeling any pressure to do it all over again in 2023! But where he's concerned nothing would surprise me.

"Arise Sir Martin"

Edmund gave me the happy news at breakfast that our good friend Martin Smith had been awarded a long-overdue knighthood in the New Year Honours!

He it was with whom we walked and lunched yesterday in Miserden, but not a word did he then breathe of the news of his elevation: great self-control, I call that.

In my congratulatory email I suggested he and Bradley Wiggins should ride down The Mall together on a tandem, to line up for their dubbing: my photograph of Martin was taken in the porch of Gloucester Cathedral during his epic Land's End to John O'Groats bike ride in 2008. (I accompanied him for a short distance.)

That trip raised a satisfying amount for charitable purposes, but it doesn't begin to compare with Martin's other generosity over a long period: causes orchestral, operatic, scientific, environmental, educational... all have benefited enormously from Smith largesse. Never has an honour been better deserved!