As in the old Chinese restaurant joke:
“Waiter, this chicken is rubbery.”
“Thankyou velly much sir.”

For those who delight in all manifestations of the Terpsichorean muse, this viral video breathes new life into a perennial cliché of early music:

What makes it even more hilarious is the utter deadpan focus of the performer. Like listening to the baroque horn (allegedly), our appreciation is heightened by imagining how very difficult it must be to play.

Just goes to show that amidst the ongoing debate about original instruments (cf. Taruskin, and Butt), our modern ears constantly require creativity… I’m sure the Sachs–Hornbostel classification system is comprehensive enough to encompass the rubber chicken.

If you want a less wacky rendition,* then this is also very fine:

Here the splendid John Finnemore (“so-called comedian”) sympathizes with Pachelbel’s wretched fate:

And now, thanks to Nick Kapur and Craig Clunas, I find this Czech tribute, which might also entertain Alexei Sayle:

See also Bach, um, marches towards the world, and The Feuchtwang variations. And do follow this post up with Mahler 5.

* On a personal note: I played the straight version of the hapless canon on a US tour with Peter Holman in the 1990s, most memorably at the Schenectady Fuchs Festival (yeah, I know). Our visit was enriched by a locally-renowned waitress who unerringly took complex orders, entirely without taking written notes, from parties of up to twenty seated around long tressle tables. That was the tour where Paul O’Dette told me the hemiola story (right at the end of this post)…