Editing mode...

Ghost Variations came back from the Unbound editor the other day 14,000 words shorter. Getting my head around the remaining 84,000 is likely to take a little time, so I may be going to earth for a bit, though looking forward to coming up for air chez Wigmore Hall tomorrow, where András Schiff reaches the last of his "last works" series (the final piano sonatas of Haydn, Mozart, Schubert and Beethoven, performed with no interval).

Tears, fears and healing at BBC Music Magazine Awards

The most touching moment of the BBC Music Magazine Awards, held last night at Kings Place, was when the Instrumental Award winner took the platform. Cellist David Watkin received his prize for his CD of the Bach Cello Suites from the hand of Sir John Eliot Gardiner, in some of whose orchestras David was lead cellist for around 20 years.

What was left unsaid was that this immensely-praised CD has had to be his last; in summer 2015 an autoimmune condition called scleroderma forced his retirement from the instrument. He continues to blaze across the early music skies, though, as conductor and devoted teacher.

In his acceptance speech he made the powerful point that if our field of music is to continue at all, we have to educate as many people as possible about it; and he gave his own children a special thank you. Storytelling, he said, is the single best preparation for giving a good musical performance, especially reading aloud to kids. His two have been treated to his rendition of the whole of Narnia and Lord of the Rings. "If you want to prepare, find some children and read to them. And do the voices!" he advised.

He accepted the award, too, on behalf of all undersung continuo cellists, those beings who often find themselves standing in the rain after playing every note of a long oratorio while a soloist who's sung for ten minutes of it swooshes by in a limo, splashing them as they go...

Just one highlight, there, of a terrific line-up to celebrate the best and most honest music-making on CD. Other winners included conductor Sakari Oramo, two of whose discs were nominated in Orchestral, and who won for his Nielsen Symphonies Nos 1 and 3 with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic; Rachel Podger and Brecon Baroque for their Vivaldi L'Estro Armonico; and the splendid young Schumann Quartet were there to perform a piece of Ives from the disc that scooped the Newcomer of the Year award.

Rosalind Plowright accepted the DVD award for Dialogue des Carmélites from Paris, directed by Olivier Py; she remarked that she was the only British cast member in a line-up of leading French singers as the doomed nuns, and had been asked to audition for the role to make sure her French was up to it. "I got the job," she declared. Record of the Year was the winner in the Opera category: Aida, starring Anja Harteros and Jonas Kaufmann, conducted by Sir Antonio Pappano. The fabulous baritone Ludovic Tézier stepped up as the cast's representative to collect the prize.

A special plaudit to the choir Tenebrae, who won for a disc of Brahms and Bruckner motets that was recorded in support of Macmillan Cancer Care. They were there and sang Bruckner's 'Christus Factus Est', and very gorgeous it was. We should all buy that CD.

You can see the full list of award winners and hear extracts from the discs here.

Many of the guest award presenters - including Ed Balls, Clemency Burton-Hill and James Naughtie - reflected on how playing the piano in public had proved far more frightening than standing at the dispatch box or broadcasting to three million people on the radio. But one award was presented by "Dr Christian" - the medical presenter of such popular-health TV programmes as Supersize Versus Superskinny - who made an impassioned speech about how important music is to him, and to so many of his patients as a veritable medicine for healing. Indeed, he thanked the music profession from the medical profession.

A beautiful evening, all in all, and one that left a tug at the heart. You realise the impermanence of things. You realise the dedication, effort, time, vocation and sacrifice that goes into the making of music and the vital nature of its support for our souls. It takes so long to build up that expertise and the structures that support its existence. It can all be swept away in the stroke of someone's pen. We can't let that happen if we want future generations to experience the joy and life-enhancing beauty we've been lucky enough to have ourselves. In Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has just earmarked nearly $1.9bn for culture and the arts. Here, though, music education is fighting for its life and entire communities stand to be deprived of it and of the performing arts due to local authority cuts. And meanwhile, this is happening... Let's get a grip now, once and for all. Factory reset of human values, please!

Stop press: Matthew Bourne is doing THE RED SHOES

Choreographer and director Sir Matthew Bourne has this morning announced a brand-new ballet for his New Adventures company next season, and it's THE RED SHOES. It will have music by, oh joy, Bernard Herrmann, film composer par excellence, Hitchcock's composer of choice and one who absolutely deserves to be brought to a wider audience; the new score will be fashioned from Herrmann's work by Terry Davies.

Matthew's passion for golden-age movies has been beautifully reflected in some of his previous work, notably his Cinderella, which is set in the Blitz and draws on stories such as A Matter of Life and Death, and I can't wait to see what he is going to do with this Powell & Pressburger classic. Ashley Shaw will dance the role of Victoria Page and the designs are by Lez Brotherston. The tour begins in Plymouth on 21 November, hits Sadler's Wells on 6 December and continues around the country until next April or later.

What would you do with it all?

The Panama Papers reports are addictive reading. Following these tales of billions of pounds/dollars/roubles/Icelandic-whatever, squirrelled away by sunny southern seas, I keep coming back to one question: what do they want to do with it all? OK, one needs a certain amount of money to live on in reasonable comfort - you want to be able to pay for decent housing, your kids' needs, healthy food, transport, heating and concert tickets without worrying about it, ideally, and these days this does not come cheap in London. But billions? Who needs billions? What on earth do you gain from having a gold-plated car?

Why do they do it? It's the difference between eat to live and live to eat - or this time, money to live, or live to amass money for the sake of it. Look. This is important. You can't take it with you. At some point your number comes up, the grim reaper appears with his/her scythe and off you go, dancing through the wheat fields of no return. At this point, you do not want to be wondering what it was all for, do you?

There used to be this thing called tax that would help to get money from those who have too much to those who have too little. It doesn't really work any more, because there appear to be ways around it for those who really do have too much. Don't get me started on what that's doing to our society.

So what is it all for? What would you do if you had billions? Supposing you won the billionaires' lottery?

Here's a musing on what I'd do if 'twere me...

First, I'd set myself up in the pleasant yet not utterly-excess-laden style to which I would wish to become accustomed. This would involve a detached house somewhere nice within London, with a big studio that could accommodate an audience, furnished with a Steinway concert grand; we'd have house-concerts in there three times a week. I'd give lots to the family, being a proud aunt and great-aunt. I'd have the best, absolute state-of-the-art, surround-sound hi-fi equipment. I'd eat only organic food. I'd have a designated champagne fridge, well stocked. I'd employ a PA, a cleaner and a driver (for a normal sort of car), and pay them well. We'd go somewhere hot every winter for several months, and we'd be able to take the cats with us wherever it was.

And then, because we are talking insane levels of lucre here, there's still a couple of billion left. So what next? What do you need to do to make you feel that you are actually a halfway decent human being, doing something worthwhile for the world you love with the supreme good fortune that has come your way?

• I'd fund hostels for the homeless and schemes to help them back onto their feet.
• I'd fund systems that help refugees learn English for free, and that encourage them to do so, so that they can function here more easily and not be maltreated and exploited.
• I'd give a lot of money to hospices.

Then we'd get to the arts...
• I'd set up a foundation to give financial support to exceptional young musicians.
• I'd set up a music school, or several.
• I'd bail out ENO, assuming they want to be bailed out.
• I'd campaign for, and pay for, statues of great artists, musicians and writers at key places in the UK, so that our artistic heritage is celebrated and visibly valued.
• I'd give something to a lot of different orchestras. Possibly funding for them to employ a counsellor or physiotherapist.
• I might resuscitate the London International Piano Competition.
• Oh, and there's that new concert hall... I'd still like the lifetime's supply of chocolate that you get in return for a £2m donation to the crowd-funding [actually, folks, that was an April Fool's joke, but some people seem to have swallowed it...], but I'd use my financial clout to pressurise them to move the damn thing to a better location. In fact, I might buy up those concrete buildings opposite Broadcasting House, demolish them and rebuild the Queen's Hall, the musical treasure of London which was flattened in the Blitz.

All this is just the beginning, of course...

• I'd keep dreaming of a better world - but at least I'd have some leverage to try and make some of it happen.

There are some wonderful, generous, enlightened and knowledgeable philanthropists out there, but also, it seems, some other people who have more cash than they know what to do with. Please, o super-rich, if you're reading this, consider picking up some tips from the above.

ENO Orchestra and Chorus win Olivier Award

At yesterday's Olivier Awards, the prize for Outstanding Achievement in Opera went to ENO's orchestra and chorus. I should think so too. Let those who want to slash them squirm, big time.

Some of the other prizes went to the Royal Opera House for Best New Opera Production - Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci directed by Damiano Michieletto (the one with the baking); choreographer Wayne McGregor for Woolf Works; Dame Judi Dench for her supporting role in A Winter's Tale; and four awards to Gypsy starring Imelda Staunton and directed by Jonathan Kent. And many more, of course. It's a fabulous celebration of the quality, variety, vibrancy and sheer resilience of the theatrical arts in the UK. 

Awards season is upon us, incidentally: tomorrow evening it's BBC Music Magazine's.