To recognize the end of the World Series (of baseball in the U.S.) on Friday, with the St. Louis Cardinals winning over the Texas Rangers in game 7, this punning combination of music and baseball from cartoonist Dan Reynolds:
(From Michael Siemon via Michael Palmer on Facebook.)
October 30, 2011 at 4:16 pm |
I originally heard this pun as a shaggy dog story…
The daughter of a wealthy industrialist in St. Louis went abroad to Europe for a year after college, and while in Germany met Count Von Trapp. They fell madly in love. He proposed, and she accepted. Her father insisted they hold the wedding in America, and since Count Von Trapp was a big fan of Beethoven, the industrialist arranged to have the St. Louis Orchestra (and Chorus) perform a series of all 9 of Beethoven’s symphonies, in honor of the couple and specifically as his gift to the Count.
It was a huge affair, and everyone who was anyone attend this series of concerts, one each night in succession. This put the clothiers into a tailspin, as the women of high society insisted on wearing a different dress each night – therefore exhausting not only the attendees but also the clothiers. To say nothing of the performers in the orchestra. Even so, being such a major event, the media got involved, with one of the sports announcers pressed into service to give an almost play-by-play rendition of the performance over the radio.
The heavy performance load proved to be too much for the bass violin players in the orchestra. In the final symphony, in the long fourth movement of Beethoven’s 9th, there is a lengthy passage where the bass violins don’t have any notes to play. Shortly after the fourth movement began they quietly slipped out of the orchestra pit and into Mad Sal’s bar across the street. There they began knocking back drinks one after the other, ostensibly to give them the liquid strength they needed to finish the piece.
About 15 minutes into this drinking binge, the 4th bass violin asks the leader of the group whether they should be heading back, but the leader assures him that all will be OK, since he had carefully tied a string around the last pages of the conductor’s score, which would force him to slow down.
Nonetheless, about 10 minutes later they finally file back into the orchestra pit and take up their instruments, under the glowering eye of the conductor, who had been conducting the movement at the pace of a dirge, hoping they would return soon.
Whether it was caused by the incredibly slow tempo, or the excessive beer and bratwurst, nobody knows for sure. But just at that moment, Count Von Trapp lets out a yelp and falls out of his chair. Immediately the family of the industrialist, their attendants, and the symphony staff rush down to his seat to see if his is OK.
Recognizing this history making moment, the radio announcer breaks into the broadcast of the performance to let everyone listening in what is going on. To that radio audience, he said:
“It is the end of the series. It is the bottom of the ninths. They’re down for the count. The bassists are loaded, and the score is tied!”