Starmer spoke up for the arts, others must do the same

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id you know Sir Keir Starmer’s father was a toolmaker? If not, where have you been hiding? The Labour leader rarely misses a chance to bring it up. What rare and refreshing fruit it was, then, to hear about another aspect of Starmer when he “opened up” in an interview with Classic FM about his musical background.

I didn’t know, for instance, that a young Keir played four instruments, of which he favoured the flute ahead of the recorder, piano and violin. Or that he was a junior scholar at the prestigious Guildhall School of Music. Or that he listens to Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto to unwind.

Hardly earth-shattering revelations, perhaps, and it’s easy to be cynical about the thinly veiled electioneering in these

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