Gordon Brown does not usually come on stage to music. The kind of man of whom it is sometimes leaked that he is actually rather fun in private, you could be forgiven for thinking finances are always running through his head. When he visited African countries earlier this year, his concession to the climate was to take off his jacket and tie but keep the suit trousers.
After prayers ("bless this rally") from Rev David Lacey, moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, the Ghanian drummers who had led the march took to the stage for one song and then made way for Mr Brown.
This was the chancellor on home turf, a minister's son speaking in a church building in the city where he was a student.
The speech itself was much like the rest Mr Brown makes these days, he makes an uplifting case for acting on world poverty now by way of recalling the poverty he saw on his visit to African countries.
In one affecting story, he spoke of a 12-year-old Aids orphan in Tanzania who had the disease herself and, said Mr Brown, no life chances at a time when she should have had her life before her. "Her decimination is burned into my soul," he said. The chancellor said he wanted to empower Africans with health, education and trade that would let them help themselves.
It was a crowd - brought together by Christian Aid - that loved Mr Brown. There was whooping when his reply to critics who said aid would not work was to proclaim "what doesn't work is doing nothing". Inevitably, there was a standing ovation - not bad for a third term chancellor outside a party conference.
The only one in the audience who did not seem impressed was a heckler who raised his kilt (to reveal a picture of Tony Blair pinned to his pants, with the word "fool" on the PM's forehead) and then accused Mr Brown of ignoring rich nation protectionism - which he actually hadn't. There was of course cheering when the heckler, who persisted to heckle, was ejected.
