Something a little calmer today, the first of Rachmaninov’s Morceaux de fantaisie (the second one of the set is the very famous C# minor Prelude). I was in two minds about whether this counts as a happy piece, but I love it very much. It’s Rachmaninov’s birthday today and I’ve spent my afternoon trying to resurrect my Russian by reading a bit of Pushkin, so this piece seems fitting. It’s a wistful sort of happiness, the dream of an elegant world that has been long destroyed, if it ever even existed.

Hallelujah! Messiah rises again
Somehow, this was actually my first live Messiah since lockdown. Dunelm Consort and Players made it worth the wait in an evening pulsating with energy and joy.