My Musical Odyssey, Part VI: If It Sounds Good, It Is Good
Peter Schickele didn't say it, but if it wasn't for him, I probably would never have known it. Peter Schickele, in case you're not familiar with him, is an American composer and humorist most famous as the man who discovered and curates the music of PDQ Bach, last and least of JS Bach's many children. The music is all intentionally awful, laden with quotes of popular songs, voiced on bizarre alternative instruments, and setting texts in hilarious ways. The whole PDQ Bach phenomenon is a satirical stab at pompous, judgmental musicologists, a class of intellectual who came to the forefront of mid-twentieth century musical criticism. Pointed as they are at such a rarified field of study, Schickele's jokes can at times seem a bit too obscure to the layperson, but then the orchestra starts playing, the soprano warbles out another twisted aria, and they're all back in the palm of his hand. Apart from his mission of getting the musical intelligentsia...