SOME time in the 1980s, I was at a concert in an old people’s home.

One of the items was the music hall song My Old Man Said Follow The Van.

I remember thinking it was dated, even for that audience.

Last week I was at an entertainment event in St Sampson’s Centre for the over-60s in York.

There it was, My Old Man, 30 years on, still deemed a suitable song for the oldies.

Most people’s popular music favourites are from their late teens and early 20s.

Do your sums, you well-meaning providers of entertainment for older people. An 80-year-old will remember the music of the 1950s, all the ageing baby boomers hum along to rock and roll, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones.

Edwardian music hall is as remote to them as to any millennial.

Few if any people at St Sampson’s last week will have any memory of the Second World War, but we were also subjected to a medley of Vera Lynn’s mawkish wartime songs.

Give us a break - it’s bad enough being an older person without being patronised by people purporting to entertain us.

N Green, York