Composer and satirist Peter Schickele, who “discovered” and performed the lost works of P.D.Q. Bach, died on Tuesday at 88.
I was lucky enough to see him a few times; his concerts were a brilliant mix of classical seriousness and utter silliness. Imagine The Unbegun Symphony; P.D.Q. was born to late to write the beginning.
It starts with Schickele conducting on an empty stage, and the musicians gradually walking out, taking their seats, and joining in. Finally the trombonists sprints out, his coat half on and half off, plays a quick fanfare, and the piece ends.
I’ve been a fan for years, and saw him in concert twice. His parodies were brilliant, and I suspect that most of the audience (and me, for that matter_ didn’t “get” a lot of it because Schickele (a graduate of Juilliard) was poking a lot of fun at technical and (to a lay audience) obscure things about music and famous musicians. So he also larded his performances with pretty obvious things that even unsophisticated fans would get. So he could play a “Courate” (Actually a “Courante”), and his musician friends would get the joke, but then he would hit the piano keys with a foot-chop and the rest of us would see that it was “karate”.
There was a lot of inspired silliness and word-play from the professor of the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople. Wikipedia gives you a taste of this:
I was surprised – credit-reader that I am – to see that he wrote the film score for 1972’s Silent Running He had lots of other non-PDQ Bach work in his ouvre. You can read it in his Wikipedia page.
I saw him live when I was in college (early 70s). I can’t remember now how he entered the concert hall, but I remember being impressed at the time. He also came to the lobby afterwards to chat with people and give autographs.
Then there was his Concerto for Horn and Hardart, for which he invented an instrument called the hardart. It had bells and whistles, which could be played, set on a base that contained glass windows behind which were sandwiches. I saw him just once, at Carnegie Hall no less, and he entered by climbing a rope down from the first balcony.
I, too, saw him when I was in college, in the mid '80s. I’d never heard of him before, but my girlfriend, who was a big classical music fan (and musician – she played piano and oboe) had, and knew that I’d enjoy it. That night, he ran from the back of the theater (main floor), down the center aisle, jumped up and belly-flopped onto the stage.
I feel lucky to have seen him when I did. First time was about '82, and he climbed down a rope from the balcony at the Seattle Opera House.
His assistant used to come out on stage and stall for time by singling out audience members who were still getting to their seats. One time I deliberately hung out in the lobby and came in late to get picked on.
After all these years I can’t remember how I’d first heard of him, or what led to me attending the concert. I had been a fan of classical music for some time, so that probably had something to do with it. I’m also a big Victor Borge fan.
R.I.P. P.D.Q.