John Potter: Did Good King Wenceslas Look Out?

John Potter is at the National Centre for Early Music on Sunday 13 December, for a relaxed conversation around his new book, Christmas Carols: an English Enchantment. It's part of the York Early Music Christmas Festival, which has been running since 1997 and is put on by the York Early Music Foundation, a registered charity.

Potter is a name with some weight behind him if you know your choral music. He started as a chorister under David Willcocks at King's College Cambridge, and later made his name in the Hilliard Ensemble, so he's spent a good part of his life working with the kind of music that sits at the heart of the festival. This session is less of a performance and more of a chat about the book, Christmas Carols: an English Enchantment, which looks at the English carol tradition.

To give you a bit of context, the York Early Music Christmas Festival was set up to bring together the music of Advent, Christmas and Epiphany, from the Medieval to the Baroque, and to weave it in with the sagas, stories and tales of the north. Potter's book fits right into that, and this is a chance to hear him talk through it in person rather than just reading it on your own.

It's a morning thing, running from 10.30am to around 11.15am, and tickets are £15 for unreserved seating, which includes coffee and cake served from 10.15am. So you can get in a bit early, grab a drink and a slice, and settle in before he starts.