The Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB) greeted the audience arriving at the Royal College of Music on Thursday evening to hear Mozart’s 24th Piano Concerto and Richard Strauss’ An Alpine Symphony.
There are 1,321 boys at Eton and 821 at Harrow. Of course this fluctuates as boys come and go, sometimes under a cloud. Even after allowing for the greater number of Old Etonians it is apparent that the number of fictional Old Etonians exceeds fictional Old Harrovians by a big margin.
I have yet to hear anything good about the remake of Murder on the Orient Express but here is something interesting. Former Royal Ballet Principal Dancer, Sergei Polunin, has a cameo role playing Count Rudolph Andrenyi.
La Bohème at Christmas should be a sure-fire winner, impossible to muck up. Sublime music, lots of snow and children, achingly beautiful arias and a heart-rending finale.
Typical, you wait ages for a Lucia and two turn up together. You can see Lucia di Lammermoor this month at Covent Garden (top price seat £165) or at Fulham Opera (top price £25).
Something really rather irritating happened on the last night of the Wexford Festival on Sunday evening. I was wearing with pride an enamel shamrock poppy and found on Monday morning that I’d lost it.