Alan Little asks if there is any classical music written during the last forty years that he might like. Before posting that question, he sent it to me as an email. Is there anything I like?

Well, as he already notes, late Shostakovich is a good place to start. I love the final symphony, number fifteen, and the last few string quartets, and the Viola Sonata, the one that quotes Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata.

But I also hear other things from time to time that tickle the ear. For example some weeks ago I heard a snatch of a recent Thomas Adès string quartet that sounded really good. It was on CD Review one Saturday morning, but I can't google my way to anything more specific. I do remember, though, that members of the Endellion (I think it was) String Quartet were talking about this. Hearing that made me think that maybe it's opera I hate, rather than Thomas Adès. But then again, I quite like the operas of Philip Glass and John Adams or at any rate the sound they make, so maybe I just like string quartets, all string quartets, so much that I even like a string quartet by Thomas Adès.

I like the nine symphonies of Sir Malcolm Arnold. Number seven was completed in 1973, number eight in 1978 and number nine in 1986. I see that I'm not the only one who thinks of him as our Shostakovich.

I'm sure I'll think of more.

One more thing occurs to me, which is that how these things are performed can be extremely important.

Take Messiaen. Okay, not very recent, but recent enough to put a lot of people off, including me. I have two recordings of his Vingt Regards Sur l'Enfant Jesus for solo piano, each as unappealing as the other (the Naxos one, unfortunately, being especially ham-fingered to my ear, which is a shame because that's the one lots will be hearing). However, on another recent Saturday morning, I dozed off during CD Review and then dozed on again, so to speak, and I found myself listening to a stunning performance of what turned out to be one of the Regards, played by Pierre Laurent Aimard. I now want that recording also, a lot. And I also want his equally raved-about recording of the Ligeti piano etudes. I have the Naxos disc of Idil Biret doing these, but suspect that she doesn't do them right.

And, although it's even less recent, I recall attending an utterly enthralling performance of a string quartet by Alban Berg, given, appropriately enough, by the Alban Berg String Quartet. In the first half they played Schubert. Close but no cigar, as the Americans say. Then in the second half: Berg. Cigar.