I vivdly remember the sound of music filtering through from the flat of our neighbour, an engineer who was an excellent cellist and passionately loved chamber music. He would often have friends round and they would play trios and quartets by Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Borodin and Chaikovsky. I used to spend hours sitting in the corridor listening to their playing. Our family also held amateur musical evenings. All this left a deep impression on me and helped form my musical consciousness.