Tomorrow, you see, I'm visiting my mum, and on Sunday I'm Boris-watching in Birmingham. So if I was to partake of the Cultural Olympiad's Open Weekend, "the start of a four-year celebration" ending in Stratford in 2102, I had to do it today - and be back in time to fetch the kids from school. That limited my choice, but at St Luke's church north of the City, string players from the London Symphony Orchestra were performing a free lunchtime concert. Together with "young musicians from East London" and aspiring pros from the LSO Young Talent programme they would be "marking the launch of the Cultural Olympiad," it said here.
I jumped on a number 55. Some complain about bus logjams in Oxford Street, but they should try Hackney's Narroway. Mustn't grumble, though. I arrived halfway through the show, and sidled into a gantry seat. Below, a dozen or so players were completing a piece by Josef Suk. The audience, which neared a capacity of perhaps 300, was various and still: elderly people and young people; boys and girls from a secondary school; two citizens in wheelchairs; one baby.
The presenter, Rachel Leach, invited questions. One of the schoolboys asked how many musicians were on the stage. "Count them!" said Rachel, cheerfully. He did. The east Londoners came from the Borough of Havering, which is as far east as London gets. The deputy mayor – "a very proud deputy mayor," she said – asked the Havering contingent to name the highlight of their tie-up with the LSO. "Playing here," said a lad behind a cello. "It's been the best." A grey-haired lady wanted to know if the show ever came south of the river. The broad answer is that it does, reaching out in different ways across the city.
Time for the final piece: Aaron Copland's Hoe Down. It was a blast; such a good one they played it twice. Afterwards, on busy Old Street, I caught up with two members of the Havering contingent heading home. One stooped beneath the bulk of vast, fibreglass instrument case. Yes, it would be a struggle on the Tube, but worth it. I waited for my bus, the luxury of the Indian summer making up for the view of the hideous advertising construct on the Old Street roundabout, surely one of the ugliest sights in town.
Had I begun my "four-year celebration"? I wouldn't put it quite that way, Lord Coe. The musicians were barely aware that they'd secured Olympic billing and, but for a few fliers around the place, regulars in the St Lukes audience would never have known. That said, there is no way I'd have gone to a lunchtime classical concert had the 2012 hype machine not directed me there. I remain a Games sceptic. But let's all make the most of it, I say.
