The worst ever recorded Orchestral recital was of Der Fleidermaus, and was performed by the Lisbon Philharmonic on August 19th 1967, at the Lisbon City Hall. Due to a problem with the hall’s central heating, the concert only went ahead because of the crippling financial problems faced by the orchestra’s owner, Plankton magnate Guiseppe Bounhi, who was hoping to sell the recordings through the LPO’s official newsletter. The heat caused all of the string instruments to fall out of tune, along with several of the woodwind instruments, whose lacquer softened. Also, as the concert continued, 13 members of the orchestra eventually passed out, until the concert was ended prematurely when a timpani player fainted and fell into a tuba. The conductor, Fredo Ballon, was quoted afterwards as saying, “I don’t think it could have been worse if you had asked Miles Davis to play in a sauna.”
Fredo Ballon, pictured here in 1972, when the Lisbon Philharmonic attempted to perform Der Fleidermaus again. Problems occurred again, this time because a bassoonist had accidentally allowed his pet ferret to escape during a rehearsal, and it had nested and given birth to young inside a cello. Ballon recalled in his autobiography Musings on Tempo, that, "The cacophony when the second strings came in was mind-boggling, but after the 1967 debacle, I was determined to see it through. By the time we reached the final act, the vibrations from the cello had either rendered the animals unconscious or killed the. I never checked. That is not my job." Photo provided by Crazyflyinmidget.
©2010 James Mathurin
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