Bachanalia

What can a young man who calls himself "a disk jockey for Bach" - who questions, when turning to Bach's Prelude and Fugue in F-sharp Major, what "such a short, fast, lively prelude is doing with such a long, slow, ponderous fugue," and who closes his explanation of tuning systems in eighteenth-century Germany by concluding that "an untempered tuning system is like homemade chocolate chip cookies" - possibly have to teach us about one of the greatest musical masterpieces of all time? If the young man happens to be Eric Altschuler, and the masterpiece happens to be Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, the answer is - just about everything. Joyously conceived and written in a spirit of true adventure, Bachanalia is at once edifying and delightfully irreverent. Altschuler's essays - one for each of the forty-eight fugues in the Well-Tempered - are full of playful, clever analogies to horror movies, human nature, football games, even sex, and a linear exposition of each fugue allows even the most unschooled listeners to follow the fugue's form in its entirety. Peppered with fascinating lore, abounding in good humor, here is a listener's guide that renders sophisticated musical concepts with simplicity and clarity and opens the door to a world of musical appreciation.