Please be seated by 4, noted the ticket, but by the time the MC began to gush about how lucky we were that Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia was in the house, it was close to 5. And she wasn’t even in the programme. ‘When was the last time you saw classical music in Nepal,’ she beamed, ‘If you saw any classical music in the last six months, you are very lucky.’ Then she switched to fluent Nepali, her sentiments embellished for our benefit: ‘People would probably say, who would pay to listen to classical music, right?’ Having established that we Nepalis are a bunch of ignoramuses, she introduced everyone on the Chief Guest Sofa, invited them to speechify, and inaugurated the inauguration.

And then we had some music.

Ok, she didn’t mean to say we were a bunch of hill-bound hicks. She meant to say we were starved of culture because of the lack of events showcasing it. Though the folks up at Kirateshwor Sangeetashram, who organize classical music shows every full moon, probably wouldn’t agree. But JayShree Music Society should be commended for bringing the renowned flautist to town. There were only two brief power cuts during the show, the soundmen behind us kept their chat down to a low murmur, and the guards constantly in-ing and out-ing the creaky door down by the front of stage made sure it didn’t bang once. And once we established that the droning buzz from the speakers was only a pre-recorded tanpura on loop (Pandit Chaurasia made do with three supplementary flautists and one local tabla thumper), we were all set.

What’s more, the music was great.