TT 354: RIP P.D.Q. Bach
"The players are all lined up and ready to begin the first inning...and they're off!"
The comic musician Peter Schickele had a marvelous knack for sending up the Western Canon. Margalit Fox’s substantial obit for the New York Times is a good read. (Gift link.)
A masterwork landed early on. Report from Hoople: P. D. Q. Bach on the Air was a 1967 Vanguard LP programmed as a rustic radio show from North Dakota. Schickele audibly chomps an apple and presents various deadpan skits featuring music from P.D.Q. Bach’s oeuvre. It’s all great, but the headliner is not from P.D.Q’s pen.
"New Horizons in Music Appreciation” treats Beethoven's Fifth Symphony as a sporting event. While Schickele is somewhat excited, the other commentator Robert Dennis slows things down by being technical and turgid. Each utterance from Schickele and Dennis has perfect taste and timing. The two doofuses defacing Ludwig van are immortal forevermore.
To follow Schickele’s comedy, it helps to know the rules and regulations of classical music. Many of the details of the P.D.Q. satires must go over the heads of those who haven’t been to enough chamber music concerts.
However, in "New Horizons in Music Appreciation,” Schickele explains quite a bit about sonata allegro form in real time. It’s one of the great lessons as well as one of the great skits.
Footnote: The late Robert Dennis was also a worthy composer, and in 2007 I interviewed him about his marvelous “Milk” for Sesame Street.
Lo those many years ago, my wife and I saw the infamous Herr Bach in concert, a delightful evening of fun and frolic (also one of the few "classical" music concerts I did not fall asleep at). I also have the Lark Quartet recording and Mr. Schickele was a fine composer!
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