Madeleine Mitchell. Photo: Daniel Ross

DURING the pandemic something bad happened to concert-going: people fell out of the habit, and weren’t quick to fall back into it when things improved. The only consolation was that they then looked around for new kinds of experience. And one of them has been the cross between a concert and house party – relaxed, informal, intimate – that is the modern salon.

In the 19th/early 20th centuries, salons were a big deal for the leisured classes. These days they’re more democratic. And a good example is the series of concerts called Salon Music that Michelle Berridale Johnson organises in her Highgate Village home. They get back into gear for 2023 with an event on Jan 13 at which you get the eminent violinist Madeleine Mitchell with her group the London Chamber Ensemble playing rare music by Herbert Howells and a string quartet by Beethoven. You also get a drink, a buffet supper, and some serious conviviality. And I can’t think of a more civilised or musically agreeable way to start the new year. Details and booking: salonmusic.co.uk

• Indian classical music is a whole other world from that of the West, but the two things can sometimes fit together surprisingly well; and Wigmore Hall gives it a go in a series of concerts running Jan 7-9 that pair Indian instrumentalists like Amjad Ali Khan with violinist Jennifer Pike, guitarist Sean Shibe, and the Refugee Orchestra Project. Think of years gone by when Yehudi Menuhin shared platforms with Ravi Shankar and you’ll get some sense of what to expect. wigmore-hall.org.uk

• Also at the Wigmore, on Jan 11, is an intriguing play with music written and performed by that most erudite of collaborative pianists Graham Johnson. Called Mother Clara, it tells the little-known story of Clara Schumann’s daughter Eugenie who fell out with her family and ran off to live here in England with a female partner. Structured around music by Schumann and Brahms, the show includes Roderick Williams in the cast, and is directed by no less than Dame Janet Suzman. So it’s classy as well as sensational. wigmore-hall.org.uk

• The London Symphony Orchestra’s big offer for the start of the year is a concert performance of Janacek’s ravishingly beautiful if heart-breakingly painful opera Katya Kabanova – conducted by Simon Rattle and with fine voices in the leads, although it’s interesting to see the biggest names (Magdalena Kozena, John Tomlinson) in supporting roles. Guaranteed to be good box office, it plays twice, Jan 11 & 13. Barbican.org.uk

• Finally, if you’re not Tchaikovsky’d-out after a festive season of Nutcrackers and Sleeping Beautys, English National Ballet settles into the Coliseum from Jan 12-22 with a post-seasonal run of Swan Lakes. It’s the traditional Petipa choreography, refreshed by Frederick Ashton. And my only warning is: don’t take too many coats, bags and umbrellas. Now that ENO, who own the Coli, have permanently (and stupidly) closed down the cloakrooms, you’ll spend the entire evening encumbered by whatever you bring. https://londoncoliseum.org/