10 Delightful Works With Crazy Titles 

Hindemith's "Overture to 'The Flying Dutchman' as Sight-read by a Bad Spa Orchestra at 7 AM in the Morning at the Well" is quite deliciously named. And the music certainly lives up to the title.

I love your mind bro -- your quest to invent interesting and informative installments about the music we all love seems boundless! This is another fabulous, well ok - ingenious, well ok, an unexpected and interesting angle. Thank You. Wind ever at your back :)

What a fun topic! Some other titles that stick in my mind include: Xenaxis: Oophaa; Gmeeoorh; Troorkh Ravel: "Aoua!" Ives: Slugging a Vampire Honegger: Mimaamaquim Grainger: Gum-Sucker's March Bolcom: Lime Jello Marshmallow Cottage Cheese Surprise

John Adams has several funny titles. ‘Naive and Sentimental Music’, ‘Son of Chamber Symphony’, ‘Scheherazade 2’, etc

We have also Villa-Lobos' Momoprecoce, and Milhaud's Le boeuf sur le toit.

Although not a downright crazy title, Zelenka's "Hipocondrie à 7 Concertanti" is certainly an eye-catching one.

I have always loved the creative titles of some François-Adrien Boieldieu's works: Rien de trop ou Les Deux Paravents, Les Voitures versées (Le Séducteur en voyage), Amour et mystère ou Lequel est mon cousin? Quite inspiring when being amongst music & language loving friends to start making up new titles and explain the plots

My suggestion to add to this playlist is a work for chorus and double-reeds (WITH their instruments this time) by the estimable Charles-Valentin Alkan, entitled ‘Marcia Funebre Sulla Morta d’un Papagallo’ - the text may not add up to much (just the words ‘As-tu dejeuné, Jaco?’), but the fugal chorus that ends the piece is masterful!

I am SO glad to see Iphigenia in Brooklyn on this list because it's a) hilarious and b) really well written music. It's one of Schickele's (PDQ's) greatest - not only to listen to but to see performed. I was lucky enough to see it with the Professor and John Ferrante - truly the best bargain countertenor. Schickele was one of the soloists playing the wine bottle - which he drains a bit each movement to adjust the pitch, eventually and wildly passing out at the very end.

Perhaps not a masterpiece but definitely in the delightful category is "Adventures in a Perambulator" by John Alden Carpenter. It sound imposing, until you realize that a perambulator is another word for baby carriage!

one of the funniest videos you've done.

Fun list!!! I might add Beethoven-Rage over a lost Penny...Or Glass-Einstein on the Beach...Or Feldman-Madame Press died last week at Ninety, or his 'Crippled Symmetry', or his 'The viola in my life', etc...Or Riley's 'A Rainbow in Curved Air'...Or Stockhausen-Helicopter Quartet-just the premise of that piece is crazy

I remember being really annoyed at a performance of PDQ Bach at the conservatoire where I studied. It was a fundraiser, and they had the musical theatre department do it. It was an unfunny disaster because none of the performers could actually produce anything remotely resembling music from the joke instruments. It absolutely takes real musicianship to pull off those kinds of gags, and when Schickele and his gang played PDQ Bach, it was always with a straight face, and the music was always "competently" executed, with just enough slapstick to get the laughs.

Poulenc's "Les biches" cries out for an acceptable translation. My suggestion was "Les demoiselles" but that's still French. Let's not forget it was commissioned (and named) by Madame Nijinska. Bax's "In a vodka shop." Several items by Slonimsky come to mind, including "Children cry for Castoria" and "Cabbage waltz." HIs book "Lexicon of musical invective" is a fountain of outrageous wit and anecdote.

I do adore Schmeltzer's "The Day of the Fart" - known in polite circles as "The Day of the Bean Festival".

I would be remiss to not mention my favorite titled piece, "Eclairs on the Deli" by Oliver Messyaunt.

Dave, I’ve always loved La Monte Young’s “The Second Dream of The High​-​Tension Line Stepdown Transformer from The Four Dreams of China” from 1962. I’d love you to do a talk on Ol’ La Monte. America’s greatest living composer

"Revised Music for Guitar and Low Budget Orchestra" "Penis Dimention" "G-spot Tornado"

Maybe it's time for a dedicated PDQ Bach video?... :)

Hi Dave! Very interesting and funny list! What about "Turangalîla-Symphonie" ?!? Not crazy enough?

Hooray for PDQ Bach! My favorite is his Grand Oratorio "The Seasonings", S. 1-1/2 tsp. (I know you can't do without the Schickele number)

We should include PDQ’s Oedipus Tex as well.

17:34 Nympholepsy. And yes, that is a real word, too!

What about Le boeuf sur le toit!?! Great pieces as well which needs a place in the Fabulous Concert Series

The ultimate crazy title: 4'33", of "nothing".

You know what is disappointing? I have that delightful 60 CD CPE Bach box set from Hanssler and that trio sonata isn't in it!

For something very much in the repertory, Ravel's le Tombeau de Couperin.

By playing unknown music we don´t rewrite the history, we just make the history richer, and future as well. Its not bad thing learn a new habit.

Hahaha..thank God I speak Greek, based on the titles