What a great pleasure it was to see the profile of the late Matt Monro, the singer with the golden voice, on BBC2 last Monday evening.

It charted Matt's life from very humble beginnings to a very popular international singer.

It brought back a lot of memories for me, as I was fortunate enough to meet him during the Seventies and early Eighties, when he appeared many times at various venues in Brighton. He was a genuinely nice person.

One could hear a pin drop in the theatre prior to the orchestra striking up and, after several short introductions of Matt's ballads had been played, he would casually walk on stage and give a performance which was simply unforgettable.

Sadly, he died in 1985 at the age of just 54 but he is as popular today as he was more than 20 years ago.

The programme ended, appropriately, with him singing that beautiful ballad Softly As I Leave You.

-John Ovenden, Brighton