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As much a part of Christmas as the fairy lights, Santa Claus, Kempton's King George and catching up with friends at Leopardstown on December 26 is The Sound Of Music, which will make its customary festive appearance on our television screens next week.

It was the final musical that Rodgers and Hammerstein would write, and early in the first act the central question the nuns pose is: 'How do you solve a problem like Maria? How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand?'

It's a rhetorical question. You can't solve a person like a conundrum, and you certainly can't hold a shaft of celestial light in your hand.