Best books… John Rutter
The choral composer has written a Christmas carol for the Follow the Stars Macmillan Carols fundraising concert, available as a podcast from 18 December (podfollow.com/follow-the-stars-macmillan-carols-podcast/view)
The Great Passion
by James Runcie, March 2022 (Bloomsbury £16.99). This new novel by the creator of
Grantchester weaves an imaginative fictional web over the skeleton of known facts about J.S. Bach during the years he conceived the St
Matthew Passion. I find fiction about musicians irritating and off-target, but this is the best example of the genre I’ve come across since Vikram Seth’s An
Equal Music.
Henry “Chips” Channon: The Diaries, Vol 2, 1938-43
edited by Simon Heffer, 2021 (Hutchinson £35). He was an appalling snob, racist, admirer of Hitler, serial philanderer and dimwit, hopeless in his political judgements and predictions, thankfully never entrusted with high ministerial office – but was also a compellingly readable diarist who lived through extraordinary times and knew everybody. If you plan to read it in bed, be warned – it weighs in at a hefty 1,098 pages.
Will She Do?
by Eileen Atkins, 2021 (Virago £18.99). As engaging a thespian memoir as you could ever wish to read, the Tottenham-totiaras story of one of our bestloved grande dames of the English theatre.
Christmas Carols
by Andrew Gant, 2014 (Profile Books £9.99). If you’re curious about the origins and history of that quaint ragbag of folk art, the Christmas carol, this is the book for you, filled with “well I never” facts and entertaining stories. Did you know that Mendelssohn wrote the music of Hark! The Herald Angels Sing as part of a cantata celebrating Gutenberg’s invention of printing?
Tom Jones
by Henry Fielding, 1749 (Wordsworth £2.50). On the basis that you should never trust a book you haven’t read before, I shall return to this over Christmas when I want to believe that, despite everything, it’s a wonderful world and people aren’t so bad. Plus, it’s got a happy ending – I can’t bear sad ones.