Madam, - The letters (Nov 8th) concerning Andrew Johnstone's review of the performance of Karl Jenkins's The Armed Man in the National Concert Hall find fault on flawed if sadly common grounds. There seems to be a fairly widespread view that musical works and performances should be judged on an Opportunity Knocks "Clapometer" scale, rather than on the basis of tasteful discrimination by sensitive and informed critics.
In relation to the concert in question, the great puzzle was not that the Jenkins piece should have been programmed with the agreeable and graceful Cherubini Requiem, but that The Armed Man should be performed in the NCH at all, when its natural home would seem to be either the Olympia Theatre or the Point Depot. - Yours, etc,
HUGO BRADY BROWN, Stratford on Slaney, Co Wicklow.