I’m not surprised that Arwa Mahdawi was enraged when a child on her flight was blowing a recorder like a referee’s whistle (A no-fly list for unruly passengers? I have a better – and crueller – idea, 9 February).
But her comment that the recorder is an instrument of torture that even talented musicians cannot make sound pleasant suggests that she has never listened to Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No 2, or heard Michala Petri playing The English Nightingale by Jacob Van Eyck, or watched Charlotte Barbour-Condini play Vivaldi’s Recorder Concerto in C minor in the 2012 final of BBC Young Musician of the Year. Benjamin Britten and John Updike were both recorder enthusiasts, like hundreds of musicians who play regularly. We do it to enjoy the beauty of the music, not as sadists who enjoy being tortured.
Judith Abbs
London
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