Not a lot of swooning goes on at the Wigmore Hall. Nor does it seem the kind of institution to endorse rapturous wailing, beating of the breast, or the throwing of either flowers or underwear. All of which leaves one with the problem of how to respond appropriately to a concert such as last night’s by Richard Egarr and countertenor Iestyn Davies. Decorous applause doesn’t quite seem to cut it when faced with such a joyous abundance of talent, and I’d have endured any amount of plague and/or restrictive corsetry for an authentic 18th-century atmosphere in which to experience this ecstatic evening of music.

A glance at the programme hinted at the identity of the orchestra: you don’t perform Prokofiev’s Scythian Suite and Janáček’s Sinfonietta in the same evening unless you’ve industrial quantities of brass and percussion to spare. This was riveting, transcendent stuff, and the most uplifting evening I’ve spent in a concert hall for years. Plus, the echoing barn of Leeds Town Hall is the ideal size for a 170-piece orchestra, a perfect place to experience Janáček’s hocketing brass fanfares. This was the closing concert of the NYO’s winter tour, and an incredible achievement for an orchestra that only assembled two weeks ago.

One reason among many to be jolly about the classical music scene recently has been the bright future of Mozart conducting. Its greatest exponent, Sir Charles Mackerras, left us halfway through last year, but then came two Don Giovannis of precocious assurance from Jakub Hrůša at Glyndebourne and Robin Ticciati in Scotland. Yesterday evening's needs-must situation deprived us of a visit from the Aurora Orchestra's honorary patron, Sir Colin Davis - whose infection, we were glad to hear, was nothing serious - but I, for one, wanted to hear how this dazzling young ensemble's principal conductor and artistic director Nicholas Collon would fare in his master's shoes.

One reason among many to be jolly about the classical music scene recently has been the bright future of Mozart conducting. Its greatest exponent, Sir Charles Mackerras, left us halfway through last year, but then came two Don Giovannis of precocious assurance from Jakub Hrůša at Glyndebourne and Robin Ticciati in Scotland. Yesterday evening's needs-must situation deprived us of a visit from the Aurora Orchestra's honorary patron, Sir Colin Davis - whose infection, we were glad to hear, was nothing serious - but I, for one, wanted to hear how this dazzling young ensemble's principal conductor and artistic director Nicholas Collon would fare in his master's shoes.

Vienna has its New Year's Day concert, conducted this year with some style but not quite enough sensuousness by Franz Welser-Möst. London could do worse for a more modest equivalent than let the Wooden O play host to a well-spiced small package of carols, seasonal songs and readings from Chaucer's times to Thomas Hardy's. But sing and play it lustily, ye Gabrieli ladies and gentlemen, or not at all. And it's sad to report that the proceedings got off to a start as soggy as the winter's afternoon they were supposed to keep at bay.

An awful lot of bad singing goes on in the name of Christmas. If it’s not the endless piped renditions of Slade and Cliff Richard, then it’s anaemic carol singers in every railway station and foyer. Each street corner becomes a concert hall (albeit one with exceptionally poor acoustics) and every passer-by an unwitting (not to say unwilling) audience member. Music becomes a commercial mood-board, a festive ear-worm to prompt charitable giving and personal spending in equal measure. How joyous then to escape the icy pavements and ambient noise for a few hours and celebrate Christmas with the ultimate musical professionals, The King’s Singers.

Perhaps it was the effect of the elaborately mosaicked and marbled stage of the Wigmore Hall, but when a black-clad Thomas Zehetmair stepped out last night to occupy this space with just his violin and Bach for company, the image was incongruous. Even devotees of the hall will surely acknowledge the fussiness of its aesthetic appeal, the lingering visual excesses of a bygone age making it as unlikely a setting for Zehetmair’s deconstructed style as for the sharp architectural edges of Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin. Yet host them it did, and in a characteristically uncompromising performance, Zehetmair managed to bring his comfortably sat audience along with him into an altogether less warm and secure place.

If you've just come back from a taxing, tiring orchestral tour, as has the London Philharmonic, the last thing you want to face is a programme of four tough works which demand, at the very least, bright-eyed vigilance but more often a tense, finger-wrecking articulation. So the players must have been relieved to find firm hands on the wheel in the shape of the electrifyingly assured Finnish master Jukka-Pekka Saraste and that most intelligent, repertoire-curious of solo violinists, Frank Peter Zimmermann.

The last time I saw Wolfgang Holzmair in concert (at last year’s Oxford Lieder Festival, delivering one of the finest live performances of Winterreise I have heard) the silence that followed the cycle lasted almost 30 seconds – an absolute age where a fidgety post-concert audience is concerned. Last night’s programme of Schumann saw Holzmair finish and pause, hands raised prayerfully, holding his listeners’ attention like so many butterflies within his cupped palms. The release that followed was ecstatic, a spontaneous homage to the musical and narrative mastery of this extraordinary singer.