Music for Victoria Day

It has to be Mendelssohn.

Queen Victoria and her consort, Prince Albert, were musical cognoscenti; both played keyboards and both sang. Victoria wrote of Albert on the day of their engagement "singing to me some of his own compositions, which are beautiful, and he has a very fine voice. I also sang for him."

The Royal couple's musical idol was Felix Mendelssohn, who became a friend, and a frequent visitor to Buckingham Palace. There are period illustrations of the three of them, sometimes Mendelssohn at the piano, sometimes Albert at the organ.

And sometimes Victoria sang (once the pet parrot had been taken out of the room; the bird liked to join in). Mendelssohn said of the young Queen, "she sang quite faultlessly and with much feeling and expression. I praised her warmly."

Would that there were recordings. But still, on Victoria Day, you can play Mendelssohn. The Queen would approve.