PDQ Bach

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PDQ Bach is a fictional composer and supposedly the youngest son of Johann Sebastian Bach . The American composer Peter Schickele published a large number of his own parodic pieces of music under this name , which have now appeared on 17 CDs.

The figure of PDQ Bach, to whom his creator ascribes the years of life 1742 to 1807, is now much more than a mere scientific joke , since his biography and his (or Peter Schickele's) music enjoy a certain popularity, especially with musicians, and again and again cited and listed. Much of the humor surrounding the fictional musician is based on English puns , which can often only be rendered rudimentary in the German translation. The list of works below therefore also includes the English-language original titles.

Fictional biography

Based on the final biography of P. D. Q. Bach , which Schickele published in New York in 1976, the following biographical details can be summarized:

PDQ Bach was born on April 1, 1742 as the son of Johann Sebastian and Anna Magdalena Bach in Leipzig . At the age of five, at the repeated insistence of his brother Wilhelm Friedemann , the father gave the boy the initials "PDQ" as his first name, without explaining what they stand for. (In colloquial English, pdq stands for “ pretty damn quick ” ). In general, Johann Sebastian hardly seemed to be interested in his last-born son; he gave him no music lessons and when he died in 1750 left him only a kazoo .
In 1755 PDQ was an apprentice to the inventor of the singing saw , Ludwig Zahnpocher. In 1756 he met Leopold Mozart in Salzburg and recommended that his newborn son Wolfgang be taught well and that he should practice a lot so that he would become the greatest billiards player of all time. PDQ later went to Saint Petersburg to visit his distant cousin Leonhard Sigismund Dietrich (LSD) Bach and fathered an illegitimate child with his daughter Betty Sue.
It wasn't until he was 35 that PDQ began to write music, mainly by plagiarizing other composers' melodies . He died on May 5, 1807 in an alleged Baden-Baden-Baden - however, his gravestone read "1807–1742". Several theories exist on this dating problem. One assumes that PDQ developed backwards musically throughout his life, another that the renowned Bach family of musicians wanted to cover up his relationship with JS Bach in this way.
After his death, Betty Sue Bach, who was now married to the Liverpool music publisher Jonathan "Boozey" Hawkes , tried to put together an edition of Selected Works by PDQ Bach . She was burned at the stake for this in 1817.

Schickele writes about PDQ Bach's importance in music history:

“PDQ Bach was a man who did not change the course of music by an iota , a man who definitively defined the doctrine of originality through incompetence, a man who triumphed over the greatest obstacle a composer has ever faced: the absolute and utter lack of talent. In the following years PDQ Bach steadfastly defied obstacles that would have driven other men into teaching or administration: the result is an oeuvre that has no parallel. "

music

Tromboon , detail

Schickele writes that PDQ Bach's music has "the originality of Johann Christian , the arrogance of Carl Philipp Emanuel and the profundity of Johann Christoph Friedrich ." Its most characteristic quality is manic plagiarism. PDQ hardly invented any of their own melodies, stealing most of the thematic material from other composers and rearranging them, often in a very strange way.

PDQ Bach often uses instruments that are rarely used in traditional orchestras , such as the trombone (German: Fasaune , a trombone with bassoon - S-bow and mouthpiece), slide whistle , double-reed slide music stand , lasso d'amore and kazoo and a whole bunch of things that aren't actually musical instruments, like balloons or bicycles . In addition, his music calls for unusual methods of playing traditional instruments, such as the use of a half-disassembled horn in the cantata Iphigenia in Brooklyn ; here also playing on wine bottles. His vocal parts contain, in addition to normal singing , effects such as coughing , sighing , screaming , laughing and sobbing .

An unexplained anachronism is the fact that PDQ Bach not only makes fun of baroque and classical music styles in his works, but also of romantic and modern music, in some cases even about country music (in Oedipus Tex ) and rap ( classical rap ). In Prelude to Einstein on the Fritz , a man has to make snoring sounds while the orchestra plays minimal music .

Selection of works

Peter Schickele has arranged the previously "discovered" pieces of music in the so-called Schickele directory (abbreviated as "S."). He divides the oeuvre of the fictional composer into three creative phases:

  • The decisive prelude (The Initial Plunge)
    • Traumarei for solo piano (Traumarei for solo piano) , p. 13
    • Echosonata for two unfriendly groups of instruments , p. 99.
    • Concerto ingrosso (Gross Concerto for Divers' Flutes, two Trumpets, and Strings) , p. -2
  • The full period (The Soused Period)
    • Pervertimento for bagpipes, bicycles, balloons and strings, p. 66
    • Serena acts for absurd instruments (Serenude) , pp. 36–24-36
    • Suite from The Civilian Barber , p. 4F
    • Schleptet in E flat major for flute, oboe, bassoon, horn, violin, viola and cello, p. 0
    • “Der steinhägerne Gast”, opera in a half-act (the half-act opera “The Stoned Guest”) , S. deest
    • Two madrigals from "Die Triumphe der Thusnelda" (Two Madrigals from the Triumphs of Thusnelda) , p. 1601
    • Erotica Variations for banned instruments and piano , p. 36 EE
    • Hansel and Gretel and Ted and Alice, an opera in one unnatural act , pp. 2 2-1
    • Concerto for Bassoon against Orchestra (Concerto for Bassoon vs. Orchestra) deest, S.
    • Great serenade for an awful lot of winds and percussion (Grand Serenade for an Awful Lot of Winds and Percussion) , p. 1000
  • Repentance (contrition)
    • Cantata: Iphigenie in Brooklyn (Iphigenia in Brooklyn) , p. 52. 62
    • Oratorio: The Seasonings , p. 1 ½ nm
    • Sonata for Viola duet (Sonata for Viola for Four Hands) , p 440
    • Notebook for Betty Sue Bach (Notebook for Betty Sue Bach) , p. 13 on the best way to 14
    • The big (b) SSTE Fuge (The grossest Fugue) , pp 50% discount
    • Fanfare for the Common Cold , p. 38.5 °
    • Dog cantata “Wachet Arf!” (The canine cantata Wachet Arf!) , S. K 9

Recordings

Many of these works have also been published on CDs. There are 17 albums released by the Vanguard and Telarc record labels between 1965 and 2007, as well as collections of individual works. Recordings of the opera “The Abduction of Figaro” and an anniversary concert “PDQ Bach in Houston: We have a problem” are also available on DVD.

Schickele is still active and on tour with two different concerts.

literature

  • Peter Schickele: The final biography of the PDQ Bach. A life against music . 2nd Edition. Atlantis, Mainz 1999. ISBN 3-254-08374-1 .

Web links

See also