Concert Review: The Unquiet Dead

Town Hall witnesses the long-awaited resurrection of P.D.Q. Bach.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Peter Schickele (left) demonstrates Steinway/Everlast's Piano Glove.
Photo from Bucklesweet Media © 2015 Peter Schickele.

Mention the name Peter Schickele in a circle of New York concertgoers and you will be met with a smile, a chuckle, and perhaps a roll of the eyes. (Unless they're young, in which case they'll need an explanation.)  Mr. Schickele, a distinguished teacher and composer based in New York, has spent half a century moonlighting as the misguided musical paleontologist whose lone discovery is the justifiably forgotten output of P.D.Q. Bach, the last and most misbegotten of Johann Sebastian Bach's children.

Portrait of P.D.Q. Bach Returned to Alleyway

The unloved last son of Johann Sebastian Bach gets dumped again.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

The Portrait of P.D.Q. Bach restored to its rightful place of honor.
Original image © 1978 Vanguard Records.

A portrait of the German wastrel and composer P.D.Q. Bach has returned from whence it came, to the alley behind a Leipzig eatery two streets up from the Thomaskirsche. No members of the press were present at the ceremony, which was conducted by two Leipzig garbagemen, Franz Schutzenschütz and Dieter Dietermeyer.