The world according to violinists

Also this week: teaching my children to drive, and a reptile’s rude awakening

Photo by Isa Toprak/Anadolu via Getty Images

I’ve been hanging out with Nigel Kennedy for a profile I’m writing, talking to him about his forthcoming 39-date tour of the UK. Nigel likes: Brahms, “that ugly fokker Viv” (of Four Seasons fame), Aston Villa and the violinist Albert Sammons. Nigel dislikes: knighthoods, Mozart and golf. Also, opera. I mention my son Gabriel is a keen violinist, upon which the former enfant terrible, now a venerable 69, invites us both to see him play at Ronnie Scott’s. What a chance for Gabriel, who is soon to take the exacting Music Performance Diploma.

The evening approaches; I scorch in from Islington, Gabriel from Northcliffe House. He’s a reporter at the Mail on Sunday. We instal ourselves at a table amid a throng of Ken Clarke lookalikes. Kennedy and two compatriots (Peter Adams on cello, Alec Dankworth on bass) saunter on; Nigel has mug of tea in one hand, violin in the other. The concert is terrific, taking in jazz, Handel, Bach and Hendrix. Kennedy is relaxed and funny, but virtuosic.

Afterwards, the green room is in full flow with Champagne, chips and vodka. Nigel greets us with open arms, sits down with Gabriel and goes through his Diploma pieces. “Mozart?! Saint-Saëns? Nah. Bach?! Now you’re talking,” he says. They talk for ages, one violinist to another. “Can I take a photo of you two for Gabriel’s violin teacher?” I say, at the end. The resulting snap features my son, smart in his tie, and Kennedy, in a Villa shirt, mouth full of chips, giving me the finger.

Everyone stalls

I have a new side hustle as a driving instructor. To my surprise, I’m quite good at it, and have embarked on teaching all four of the junior Millards. Two down, two to go. My vehicle of choice is an elderly VW Polo, manual, with extra mirror on the windscreen. You can’t drive properly without knowing how to change gear, I think. What happens if you can only drive automatic and you need to hire a car in, say, Chile? This week, I was instructing younger son Lucien in the delights of the three-point turn. He’s home from university for what is euphemistically known as Reading Week. This summer, he’s going to Chile.

It’s like having a second chance at parenting, deploying the same strategies first honed when a child is learning how to read, or play an instrument. Much patience, repetition and encouragement are needed, particularly with clutch control. “Everyone stalls, don’t worry,” is the current favourite, as well as: “Mirror! Stop!” I reassure him that London traffic goes so slowly you are never going to run into major problems – unless you run into the back of someone else. Next week, the VW is booked into a garage. For a new clutch.

La-la-la-Loco

I think Nigel would have softened to The Opera Locos, brought by the Madrid company Yllana to a packed Sadler’s Wells. Five exuberant Spanish singers, with no set, orchestra or semblance of plot, but a plan to deliver opera’s greatest hits. An increasingly hysterical audience joins in on numbers from La Traviata, Carmen, Turandot, even the Queen of the Night’s top B-flat. “Do you go to the opera much?” I say to my neighbour in the stalls. “No, it’s too expensive. But I love this,” he says, launching into the “la la la” bit from Rossini’s “Largo al Factotum”. Standing ovations, shouts of bravo, an audience of all ages and styles. Opera is fun! Who knew?

Gold-star student

After 12 marathons and about 50 halves, I’ve hung up my running shoes. I’ve done the elite ones (the majors), the beautiful ones (Florence, Paris, Edinburgh) and the outliers (Great Wall of China, Hull). Daily running has been traded for weights in the gym and piano practice. Each day, I do half an hour of scales, Bach and Beethoven. Two things. Firstly, if you play the piano every morning you have music rolling round your head all day. Secondly, you get better. My teacher Rina, who instructs children as well as adults, is delighted. She gives me a gold star sticker in my book each week. “The adults like their stickers much more than the children, I find,” she observes.

Defrosting Dwight

He’s awake! Our tortoise, Dwight Lampard, named after the star of the US Office and the former Chelsea midfielder, is back from nine weeks’ snoozing at the Tortoise Hotel in Maidenhead. His accommodation was an industrial-sized fridge, shared with 46 other reptilian residents. Dwight seems to have flourished while in the salad crisper. Plus, think of all the grim things you have missed, I whisper as I give him a tepid bath. The Epstein farrago. The demise of Russell & Bromley. Jessie Buckley giving birth in a wood during Hamnet. The whole of Hamnet.

Rosie Millard writes “The Arts Stack” on Substack

[Further reading: Melvyn Bragg’s class act]