I passed two old guys grumbling at each other in the hall today.

Grump 1: “Oh the music that these kids are listing to today!”
Grump 2: “Bah! Gahbage, GAHbage.”
Grump 1: “All the swearin’ and all they talk about is murdah.”

Then, I was out of earshot, smiling ear to ear, and racking through my mental song catalog to prove them wrong. Within two seconds, I had Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” (1956) with the famous line “I shot a man in Reno/Just to watch him die”.

I wonder if in Mozart’s day, there were old guys sitting around in powdered wigs saying things like:

Grump I: “Oh the music that these kids are listening to today.”
Grump II: “Rah-thur! ‘Tis the devil’s work, I say.”
Grump I: “All that staccato. Give me a Viennese waltz any day.”
Grump II: “Even on the Sabbath?”
Grump I: “Of course not. Now, put the torch down and untie me.”
Grump II: “Warlock.”
Grump I: “Dandy. Seroiusly. Put the torch down…”

Once I get old enough that times that I can’t remember are replaced with various versions of Utopian paradise, please put me in my favorite chair, order me a tall glass of shut the fuck up, and flip on my holographic Slayer LP.

Note 1: I realize that Mozart and witch trials do not historically coincide, but I doubt that anyone would recognize period composers Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber (1644 – 1704), Juan Bautista Jose Cabanilles (1644 – 1712), or John Blow (1648 – 1708), thus ruining the joke.

Note 1a: I said blow.
Note 2a: John Blow was originally a choir boy, and in 1676 was made one of the Chapel Royal Organists at Westminster
Note 2a.1: I said “organist,” which not only contains “organ” but is only slightly less funny than “pianist”.

Posted in Music