Carey was the big draw at Milan’s San Siro, but she was outweighed by pop-classical artists – and a sizeable dollop of kitsch

The Winter Oympics opening ceremony arrived shrouded in mystery. There wasn’t a lot of advance publicity about what might happen, beyond a list of musical performers, heavier on popular classical names including Andrea Bocelli and Lang Lang than pop stars – and a quote from the event’s creative lead and executive producer, Marco Balich, that it would eschew “hi-tech and bling”.

Anyone desperate for intel might alight on a tabloid live stream that proffered the news that “it could last THREE hours” – it wasn’t entirely clear whether this was meant as enticement or warning – and a news report suggesting the International Olympic Committee were concerned that Team America might be booed, the legendary charm of the Trump administration having done so much to spread goodwill towards the US over the last 12 months. In fact, what the president of the IOC said was: “I hope that the opening ceremony is seen by everyone as an opportunity to be respectful of each other” – so there was always the chance she was concerned the crowd might take against Denmark, but it didn’t seem likely.