THE Town Council, and the town, can congratulate each other on a very successful first Knutsford Musical Festival - with local talent on show, and performers from further afield.

If the passionate Rebecca Downs Band returns to Knutsford, I will be there: they were sensational, and the support was excellent.

The festival logo tells us that it was “established” in 2017, which suggests that the festival will be an annual thing.

Indeed, it might even have granted itself a ‘Royal Charter’ because the logo presents what appears to be the figure of Cnut standing in the ‘River Lily’ with an electric guitar over his shoulder.

But at what is the Cnut in the logo sticking his tongue out?

Perhaps he is sticking it out in the face of those fuddy-duddies who question the town’s fondly held but historically unjustified tradition that Cnut the Dane came here and gave his name to it.

However, it should be better known that there is good evidence that Cnut was in fact our second known singer songwriter in English, after Caedmon, in the 7th century. A part of a song of his, and the story of its composition, is to be found in the ‘liber eliensis’ the 12th century annals of Ely Cathedral.

Michael Gibson Knutsford