Henry Purcell's music to Dublin audiences. He also recorded an LP of Purcell songs with Frank, and recorded some for a BBC radio programme. He also played with the Dublin Consort of Viols (an offshoot of the Consort of Saint Sepulchre), which specialised in the performance of works by Purcell, Byrd, Lawes, Jenkins (whose music John adored) and other composers of that genre. He worked regularly with the New Irish Chamber Orchestra and went with them to Italy in 1975, where he was unexpectedly presented with a papal medal from Pope Paul VI after an impromptu performance with Our Lady's Choral Society in St. Peter's Square. John Beckett went with NICO to China in 1980, a trip that he greatly enjoyed. He performed on a Kirckmann harpsichord of 1772 and an early nineteenth-century Broadwood grand piano, both owned by Trinity College Dublin, and conducted the RTÉ Symphony Orchestra in works by Mahler, Elgar and Sibelius. By this time, he and Ruth had moved to Bray, County Wicklow. Likes and dislikes At around this time in his life, John Beckett recollected a journey to the Great Blasket Island, off the west coast of Ireland, which was made in a currach over a rough sea during the 1940s, when the island was still inhabited. He enjoyed the experience of living and drinking with the locals in their rough cottages and listened to the traditional music and songs that they performed. He relished the earthiness of plain, simple Mediterranean ceramics and loved Byzantine icons (especially those darkened with age). He was heavily influenced by the writings of his cousin Samuel Beckett, James Joyce (whom Samuel had worshipped) and Kafka. He also developed a liking for the sparse, angular shapes of Chinese and Japanese calligraphy, which was mirrored in his extraordinary handwriting. The roughness and irregularity of a Japanese tea bowl fascinated him. His two greatest treasures were a bamboo chair, purchased in China, and an old hanging wall clock that had belonged to his mother, which had been fixed for him by Cathal Gannon and about which he often spoke. He also savoured well-flavoured, peasant food and had a strong penchant for garlic which he often carried in his pocket, using the cloves to flavour his much-loved whiskey. John venerated James Joyce to the same extent that he worshipped Johann Sebastian Bach and read Joyce's Ulysses regularly. He visited Joyce's grave in Switzerland