It’s at the annual Baden festival that these minor irritations make themselves painfully felt. Yet the musical director in charge has everything in his favour; no cheeseparing economies are forced upon him, nor is he fettered in any way. Monsieur Bénazet, convinced that the best approach is to allow him a free hand, doesn’t interfere in anything—except paying the bills. “Be as lavish as you like,” he says, “I’m giving you carte blanche.” Quite right too! With music, that’s the only way to produce anything fine and beautiful. You’re laughing, I see; you must be thinking of Jean Bart’s reply to Louis XIV: “Jean Bart, I’ve appointed you commander of the fleet!”

“Well done, Sire!”

Go on then, laugh! Jean Bart was right all the same. Yes, sire, you did well; it would be a good thing if sailors alone were chosen to command fleets. It would be a good thing, too, if once a Jean Bart was appointed, a Louis XIV should never start checking on his manoeuvres, making suggestions, and burdening him with his own anxieties, as in the first scene of Shakespeare’s Tempest:

Despite having so many resources at his disposal, and this precious freedom to use them as he wishes, it’s still a hard task for the musical director to make a success of a festival like Baden, so great is the number of small obstacles and so damaging the impact that even the slightest of them can have on the whole of an enterprise of this kind.