A choir of schoolchildren sang for King Charles when he officially opened a University of Oxford building. Charles toured the university's Stephen A Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities, a world-class hub which he said was a "pleasure" to visit.
Official Opening Ceremony
The King was welcomed to the facility on Friday by the university's Chancellor, Lord William Hague, before a choir of local secondary-school children performed a rendition of Claudio Monteverdi's Cantate Domino for him. US businessman and chief executive of the investment firm Blackstone Stephen Schwarzman, who funded the building with a £185 million donation, also greeted the King.
Charles unveiled a plaque from under a blue cloth to commemorate the official opening, and said: "Nothing could give me greater pleasure than to be with you today just for a short moment to celebrate this remarkable building, which I now discover has all the humanities departments in one place. I was saying when I was at Cambridge 60-something years ago I had to bicycle a very long way to get here. So I'm sure this will make an enormous difference to the university."
Tour of Facilities
In the Great Hall, accompanied by Lord Hague and Mr Schwarzman, Charles spoke to teaching staff from the university's humanities departments and people from local community groups. He visited the Sohmen Concert Hall, a 500-seat auditorium in the building, which is the world's first Passivhaus-standard concert venue, meaning it is ultra energy-efficient. Charles, wearing a great suit and pink tie, observed the space from the balcony while a student music group rehearsed.
He then visited the Bate Collection, where he was shown a range of wind, string, and percussion instruments from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. Charles viewed a manuscript of Auf Christi Himmelfahrt Allein by German composer and musician Johann Sebastian Bach, which is one of only four autograph manuscripts by the composer in the UK.
King's Interest in Manuscript
Richard Ovenden, who is a librarian for the Bodleian Libraries, said the King was "very interested" in the manuscript. Charles told Mr Ovenden he had read a famous biography about Bach by John Eliot Gardiner. Mr Ovenden told the Press Association: "To have our present king come is, of course, a huge honour, and great to have such a ceremony, the unveiling of the plaque, and the sort of official opening of this building is a great milestone."
A class of primary school children gathered in the heat to wave Union flags for the King when he left the building. The King, who occasionally has a leaky vessel in the eyeball, appeared to have a bloodshot eye at the event.
