2001: A Gymnastic Odyssey
I can’t claim the credit for this story, but it is too good not to share. A friend of a friend was the organist at a wedding. The bride decided to use, as her entrance march, Richard Strauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra, the famous, dramatic and imposing music used for the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey as well as for many grand entrances of a sequin-caped Elvis Presley. Odd enough, but there is more. The organist obliged her, and made his attempt at this piece on a very old, tiny, feeble pipe organ, and the effect was less than dramatic. Imagine hearing those famous ascending brass notes with timpani “Baaahhhhhmmmmmm…… baaaahhhhmmmm… baaahhhmmmmmmm… BAH-DUMMMMMM!!!! BOOM boom BOOM boom BOOM boom,” interpreted on something resembling an organ grinder’s instrument, “ffffrrrrr… fffrrrrr… ffffrrrrrr… hah-hummmm… FEH feh FEH feh FEH feh…” when suddenly the bride’s cousin, who is a gymnast, precedes her entrance with a tumbling routine up the aisle, sticking his landing up near the altar with a flourish. Yes, this was a planned inclusion for this ceremony. I will always wonder if the effect was as the couple intended. I suppose it was, because, after all, their main intention was to get married, and that they did. And no one has forgotten it, including me, and I was not even there. Leslie Crane |
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