Maybe it’s time to revitalize the idea of a Queen’s Musician. “Of course the whole notion of having a master of the queen’s music is an anachronism, especially with a royal family that shows little obvious interest in the arts, but then so, equally, is the role of the poet laureate, and the present holder of that post, Andrew Motion, at least has shown how a nebulous role can be used effectively. There are plenty of issues that a publicly confident and committed master of the queen’s music could get behind, numerous ways in which he or she could promote new music and expand its audience.”