Monarchy and the Arts

As a monarchist musician, I am intrigued though not surprised by the common enemies that royalists and arts advocates face. First it was Mark Oppenheimer (Americans who watch the royal wedding are traitors/kids shouldn't take music lessons), now the perhaps even more execrable Hamilton Nolan (the British monarchy should be abolished and the royal family imprisoned/don't give a dollar to the New York City Opera). Classical music could not have developed without royal patronage, and European royal occasions would not be as grand without classical music. Music and Monarchy go together brilliantly, as David Starkey recently explored, and even non-royalist musicians should be wary of the utilitarian, bean-counting, egalitarian arguments employed by anti-royalists as they can be easily turned against the Arts as well. What ought to unite monarchists and musicians is a commitment to the Good, the True, and the Beautiful as valuable for its own sake.