LIFE

In praise of crazy

Life, Ung-Aang Talay, Published on 01/03/2016

» There is a story by the American writer Donald Barthelme in which a condemned man is offered the chance to hear one last song before he is executed. He requests Charles Ives' Fourth Symphony, a good choice because with its demand for a huge orchestra, chorus, organ, three pianos (one tuned in quarter-tones), and ultra-complex scoring, the wait involved in preparing a performance would be sure to keep him alive for a long time.