What a long, strange weekend it's been

How was your weekend? Mine was pretty action-packed.

On Friday, Mark, Neal Emma and I tucked into the Mussaman curry which was this month's Culture, Cheese and Pineapple experience. It was vegetarian (squashes instead of meat) in deference to Emma and Mark, and Neal did all the cooking. It was a revelation - coconut, tamarind, lime leaves and all sorts of other goodnesses combined to produce food heaven, so thanks Neal. We washed it all down with an excellent array of real ales, and Emma provided horrendously chocolaty puddings.

Then Saturday saw the British Fencing Annual General Meeting in Telford. Most impressively, a sport of 10,000 participants managed to see 23 people turn up at the AGM, most of whom were directors or bigwigs of some sort. I managed to ask a couple of awkward questions, a rule change was pushed through enabling the board to change any bye-laws without consultation, and we sat through presentations about the future of fencing: basically, let's grab as much cash as is going, professionalise the structures and produce recreational and medal-winning fencers. I know this doesn't sound too revolutionary, but the buffers don't like it, perhaps put off by the inevitably management-speak it was all dressed up in. I'm quite keen though: it's time my sports wasn't solely associated with posh schools and the aristocracy - it isn't in other countries.

Finally, Neal, Emma and I went to Birmingham for the Arts Festival. We enjoyed Brawd (blokes with guitars), the Music Maze (participatory sessions) run by Birmingham Contemporary Music Group (Emma declined to bang things, but Neal and I had a ball) and foaming pints of real ale. We played on the BBC's science toys (Bang Goes The Theory) and mooched around the art stuff in the Town Hall. The only down side was the absence of the hot girls with books Neal had spotted the day before.

Wig Out to the In Sound from the 18th Century

Today's an all-Mozart, all-CD affair. The latter because S-Z in rock and all my classical vinyl are inaccessible due to the 1m x 1m x 1m cube of unread books currently testing the floor joists at the end of the bed. The former because I decided that I should acquaint myself a little better with old Wolfgang and invested in a 170-CD complete works. I'm heavily into medieval and Renaissance music, utterly devoted to Bach (the cello suites will be this planet's greatest contribution to galactic civilisation long after our extinction), and hugely into 20th-century classical music, but there's a yawning void where my knowledge of Mozart, the Classical composers and the Romantics should be.

I'm no snob - I'll happily make comparisons between the Field Mice, the Boo Radleys and Johann S. and distrust those devoted solely to classical music (the last one I met recommended Bruckner because 'the Fuhrer listened to his music after dinner every evening'), and there's an awful lot of conservative dross (on heavy rotation over at Classic FM), but at the same time, classical music doesn't have to pander to playlists, short-term profit or people half-listening. Dylan eviscerated mainstream America in the 60s and 70s - many of the major classical composers did the same. You can't listen to Penderecki's Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima, or certain Stockausen without understanding that music, even wordless music, can pose just as great a challenge to the status quo as any other protest song. It's only when rich people, subsidies and 'the great and the good' hijack this stuff that all the life's sucked out of it.

So I guess that all I can do is encourage you to storm the concert halls and take them back. Start by going to the Music Maze for Adults run at the CBSO Centre by the Birmingham Contemporary Music group. Turn up with any old instrument from your loft (they'll give you one if you don't have anything), and spend the evening making thrilling, visceral music - skill levels unimportant. 15th May, CBSO centre, 6.o0-9.30, £10. Listen to Late Junction on Radio 3, the show that plays anything from anywhere in the world (including rock, dance and probably even donk) as long as it's interesting.

First video up is an extract from the Penderecki - it's horrible because, well, nuclear war is horrible. Could pop music do this? Possibly, but the industry and our expectations aren't really set for 'searing' as a positive term. The second on is Yo-Yo Ma playing Bach rather beautifully.

I've given up - the people across the road are playing dancehall so loud that my windows are shaking. I'm unmoved.