As if to remind us that pop music need not have a cutting edge, nor have anything of note to say, yesterday’s inaugural Summertime Ball took six fast-moving hours to showcase 16 acts, none of whom would even think of troubling a goose by shouting “boo!” at it.

Naturally, this meant some ghastly old schlock, too many singers singing suspiciously well over backing tapes and Ciara, whose one-song set was still too long. Meanwhile, occasional hosts Johnny Vaughan and Lisa Snowdon had the easy-going, twinkly-eyed bonhomie of Gordon Brown and Caroline Flint.

Of those who stumbled, Leona Lewis seemed to be
preparing herself for a summer on the cruise ships rather than imminent, world-conquering stardom, and covering Snow Patrol’s Run alongside a gospel choir was as hopeless in the flesh as it promised on paper.

Gallery: Capital FM Summertime Ball

Daniel Merriweather was hit by the triple whammy of flat vocals, dreary songs and an absence of charisma, while the sexless Saturdays unveiled themselves as the world’s first dowdy girl group. At these soul-crushing moments I despaired for pop music and its future.

Yet, my despair was, in parts, misplaced. From the moment opener Katy Perry appeared dressed as a Cath Kidston handbag, there were moments to savour: James Morrison brought rare earnestness, while Calvin Harris’s stadium house went down a treat even when the heavens opened during I’m Not Alone.

But the real victors were American. Lionel Richie — four songs, mercifully none recorded more recently than 1986 — worked the crowd like the wily old fox he is, and Akon was a bundle of crowd-surfing high energy.

Better still, Enrique Iglesias, more handsome than any man has a right to be, charged through the crowd to sing from a gantry near the halfway line and turned a presumably normal woman into a hyperventilating, teary jelly when he summoned her on stage to croon Hero at her.

Surprisingly, the headliners were the inherently silly former boy band Blue, playing their first show since re-forming. The foursome sported the rictus grins of those whose solo careers did not go to plan, but Richie joined them for a sterling version of his Easy and I’d forgotten what little gems All Rise and One Love are. Perhaps pop is in rude health after all.