Ships by Brian Eno and Baltic Sea Philharmonic at Southbank Centre

And to think that I only went to see this because I had some credit at Southbank Centre.

Of course I bought the early Roxy Music albums, and I had heard Brian Eno give a lecture on art and humanity (I think!) when at university yonks ago, and I bought some of his solo works, particularly Ambient 1: Music for Airports, and I bought Bang on a Can's version of that too, but for reasons verging on insanity I was not quick to buy tickets. Eventually I saw reason and paid out a somewhat massive £135 for seat CC - 39 in Royal Festival Hall. That is about what I pay for Glyndebourne tickets!

Combined, Brian Eno and Baltic Sea Philharmonic was a fest of musicians wielding both classic and rock instruments. They were all dressed in black, played without a score, were spread standing on two levels and on the lower level they moved around a little.

The show was completed by an extraordinary effective light show which upgraded it from a mere concert to a performance.

The show opened with The Ship, Eno's album from 2016. This had four dark and brooding parts which glided along beautifully. At times is sounded a little like a sea shanty, at others there were the tannoy sounds from Airports and there was an awful lot else going on too. I loved it.

The second of the three halves was a collection of other songs from Eno's extensive back catalogue, non of which I knew. They had the same sort of atmosphere as The Ship not least because the same set of musicians was used throughout. Whoever scored the songs for this orchestra did a fine job.

One song, Brian told us, had been written about Israeli and Gazza several years ago in the expectation that the issue would have been resolved by now, instead it was the worst it had ever been. He said that anyone not marching for peace should be, and got applauded for saying that.

A little after an hour of the expected seventy minutes everyone took a well deserved standing ovation only to return shortly after for an encore. This was more like a rock concert than a classical one after all.

That encore consisted of several more songs and took us up to almost the ninety minute mark, with a few people sneaking out before the end. It was more a third act than an encore and I certainly welcomed the extra time.

Ships far exceeded my reasonably high expectations and it was a phenomenal show. Of course Eno's music was the heart of it but the arrangements, the musicianship and the staging all added to the experience.