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Hi Janeiro
The themed letters in 44d are the 2nd and 3rd, not the first two.
Does that help?

(Sorry - 48d of course)

Such an obvious explanation! Thank you so much for indicating my error, though I did have a moment of panic thinking I had 44 down wrong and had maybe messed up the whole thing! I can, rather belatedly, get on with the day ie today’s Guardian Cryptic!

Well what a great puzzle. A worthy follower to the great Araucaria holiday specials. Does anyone remember the Alfred Lord Tennyson alphabetical?

Thank you Feebee and apologies for the belated reply.

Like Janeiro I have the answer to 48d, simply because there was only one letter to find, which I could work out from the theme. However I do not understand the parsing of the 4-letter word. Any help?

62 ... not half...ceremony...lose half of it..

Thanks xwordfan, that makes sense of the definition but I don't understand how we get ''ceremony"- being dim, I'm sure. And while we're at it, struggling to parse 22a, 47a and 52a. With 47a I understand ( I think) that we have to subtract 3 letters from a bigger word meaning, undecided, but I don't understand what those three words have to do with 'study'.

Hi Grum,
48 ceremony = ritual in the clue
22 the reference is to Samuel Barber and his famous work. The answer parses 2 letters (present) + 4 letters (commission)
47 those three letters are a word for study, though the usage is archaic. It crops up in crosswords quite often so worth remembering
52 parses 1 letter from the clue + 4 letters for the road charge

Hi Grum,

48 - "ritual" = 'ceremony' then you follow the instruction in 62d leaving you with a word meaning "wrap up a body in cloth"

22a - 2 letter acronym for "present" (time) + a word meaning "commission" (on currency trades)

47a - you start with a 12 letter word meaning "undecided" and remove a 3 letter "study" (it's an old Edmund Spenser word meaning 'to know, learn or study' leaving you with "comprehensive"

52a - I can't see a 52a?