He was appointed OBE in 2002, made a Knight of the Order of the White Rose in Finland, a country about whose opera he enthused, and was an honorary member of the Royal Academy of Music.
He read history at Christ Church, Oxford, and did his National Service with the Education Corps. He had a brief career with the publisher Rupert Hart-Davis. During this time he began moonlighting as a journalist, using his middle name as a surname to avoid incurring his employer's wrath.
He was an influential and entertaining opera critic. He was the editor of Opera magazine from 1986 to 1999, and, at various times, opera critic of Harpers & Queen, The Spectator, and The Times.