We are always looking for interesting wasy to look at classical music. Today, we get our fix via Clive Paget of Australia’s Limelight magazine. Entitled “Classical Music's 10 Deadliest Serial Killers,” Clive brings to light the red-handed serial killers in popular classical music performances.
Paget has a few regulars of the insane-in-the-membrane type like Jack the Ripper, Billy the Kid and Sweeny Todd. However, he also keeps it interesting with a few lesser known villains of the operatic kind.
Paget starts his list with the character Mr. Punch of Harrison Birtwistle’s opera Punch and Judy. Punch is slightly dim-witted but none-the-less he takes six victims. His modus operandi includes throwing babies into fires, wife-murder, lethal injection of a medical practitioner, stabbing of a legal professional, sawing a victim in half inside a musical instrument case and hanging the hangman; respectively.
Later in the list Paget gives his only female choice: Lucrezia Borgia of Donizetti’s opera by the same name. Her weapon of choice is wine laden with poison. Downside: she kills her own son and lives in a loveless marriage.
Another standout choice is The Mikado operetta by Gilbert and Sullivan. Mikado takes numerous victims by way of various forms of arbitrary ‘judicial’ execution. For some, that means being boiled in oil and covered in molten lead.
Take a look at the fascinating list of villains and perhaps you will find your Halloween costume for this year in the numbers.
