The ''Concerto for Horn and Hardart'', S. 27, is a work of

Peter Schickele Peter Schickele (; July 17, 1935 – January 16, 2024) was an American composer, musical educator and parodist, best known for comedy albums featuring his music, which he presented as being composed by the fictional P. D. Q. Bach. He also hoste ...

composing under the pseudonym

P. D. Q. Bach P. D. Q. Bach is a fictional composer created by the American composer and musical satirist Peter Schickele for a five-decade career performing the "discovered" works of the "only forgotten son" of the Bach family. Schickele's music combines Par ...

. The work is a

parody A parody is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satire, satirical or irony, ironic imitation. Often its subject is an Originality, original work or some aspect of it (theme/content, author, style, e ...

of the double

concerto A concerto (; plural ''concertos'', or ''concerti'' from the Italian plural) is, from the late Baroque era, mostly understood as an instrumental composition, written for one or more soloists accompanied by an orchestra or other ensemble. The ...

, a classical music genre in which two soloists are accompanied by an orchestra; in this concerto, one soloist is a conventional

French horn The French horn (since the 1930s known simply as the horn in professional music circles) is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B (technically a variety of German horn) is the horn most o ...

, but the other, the hardart, is a fanciful keyboard that uses a variety of different toys and

noisemaker A noisemaker is something intended to make a loud noise, usually for fun. Instruments or devices commonly considered "noisemakers" include: * pea whistles * air horns, composed of a pressurized air source coupled to a horn, designed to create an ...

s, such as plucked strings, blown whistles and popped balloons, to produce each note in its range. The name "hardart" and including name of the concerto is a play on the name of proprietors

Horn & Hardart Horn & Hardart was a food services company in the United States noted for operating the first food service automats in Philadelphia, New York City, and Baltimore. Horn & Hardart automats ushered in the fast food era and at their height, they wer ...

, who pioneered the North American use of the

automat An automat is a type of fast-food restaurant where food and drink are served through a vending machine, typically without waitstaff. The world's first automat, Quisisana, opened in Berlin, Germany in 1895. By country Germany The first docu ...

. Like the automat, the hardart had small windows in the front where the musician had to insert coins to remove implements needed to strike or otherwise play the devices that produced the notes. The composer

Philip Glass Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimal music, minimalism, being built up fr ...

, a classmate of Schickele's, helped build the actual instrument; Glass and the others tasked with building the hardart made it a

transposing instrument A transposing instrument is a musical instrument for which music notation is not written at concert pitch (concert pitch is the pitch on a non-transposing instrument such as the piano). For example, playing a written middle C on a transposing ...

without telling Schickele, who had to transpose at sight during the performance. As with other works that Schickele attributed to P. D. Q. Bach, "beneath the satire one finds very sound technique and invention in the music." The piece is in three movements: The first

movement Movement may refer to: Generic uses * Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece * Movement (sign language), a hand movement when signing * Motion, commonly referred to as movement * Movement (music), a division of a larger co ...

is in

sonata form The sonata form (also sonata-allegro form or first movement form) is a musical form, musical structure generally consisting of three main sections: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. It has been used widely since the middle of t ...

, though with numerous mishaps. It quotes the first movement from

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition and proficiency from an early age ...

's Symphony No. 29. The second is a set of

variations Variation or Variations may refer to: Science and mathematics * Variation (astronomy), any perturbation of the mean motion or orbit of a planet or satellite, particularly of the moon * Genetic variation, the difference in DNA among individual ...

which, as Schickele notes, have no relationship to the initial theme. It quotes second movement from Piano Concerto No. 21 (Mozart). It concludes with a

cadenza In music, a cadenza, (from , meaning cadence; plural, ''cadenze'' ) is, generically, an improvised or written-out ornamental passage played or sung by a soloist(s), usually in a "free" rhythmic style, and often allowing virtuosic display ...

that shows off the abilities of the hardart. The third movement, a minuet ("with cream and sugar"), ends with the bursting of the balloons on the hardart. The concert was released on Schickele's first album, '' Peter Schickele Presents an Evening with P. D. Q. Bach (1807–1742)?'' (1965), with Schickele playing the Hardart and

Jorge Mester Jorge Mester (born April 10, 1935, Mexico City) is a Mexican conductor of Hungarian ancestry. He has served as the artistic director for the Orquesta Filarmónica de Boca del Río, Veracruz, since it was founded in 2014. Biography He studied condu ...

conducting. A portion of the cadenza was sampled by the group

Jurassic 5 Jurassic 5 (stylized JuraSsic 5) is an American alternative hip hop group formed by rappers Charles Stewart (Chali 2na), Dante Givens (Akil), Courtenay Henderson (Soup (Jurassic 5), Soup, Zaakir), and Marc Stuart (Marc 7); and disc jockeys Mar ...

in the song "Monkey Bars" on their album ''

Quality Control Quality control (QC) is a process by which entities review the quality of all factors involved in production. ISO 9000 defines quality control as "a part of quality management focused on fulfilling quality requirements". This approach plac ...

''."Jurassic 5 "Monkey Bars" – P. D. Q. Bach ''Concerto for Horn and Hardart'', S. 27"
whosampled.com The inscription ''Minor Labor Matris'' on the hardart
work details and description,

Carl Fischer Music Carl Fischer Music is an American sheet music publisher. It was founded in 1872 in the East Village neighborhood of New York City as a musical instrument repair shop. Except for a brief period in the early 1930s, it has always been the family- ...

is Latin for "Less Work for Mother", the advertising slogan adopted by Horn & Hardart in 1924.

References

External links

Work details
schickele.com * {{P.D.Q. Bach P. D. Q. Bach Musical parodies Hadart 1965 compositions