“Many concert-goers would agree that there tend to be more bad encores than good. There’s nothing worse than an indifferent encore after an indifferent concert, when all one wants is a stiff drink. There’s a particular sort of heart-sinking moment when an overkeen recitalist settles back to their instrument, having taken only a single curtain call. The last gesture in a concert is as potent as the last sentence of a book: you take the atmosphere of it out into the world with you, and if the final encore is crass or inappropriate, it can undermine the whole of the rest of the concert.”