Shatner’s Bassoon

Satirist Chris Morris persuaded various media figures that Shatner’s Bassoon was an area of the brain that controlled time perception, and that it was was targeted by the fictional drug ‘cake’. Taking his cue from the musical equivalent of time extended, diminished and reviewed by means of augmentation and recapitulation, Morgan Hayes has written a witty but no insubstantial essay making prominent use of these techniques. The piano part is first among equals in an ensemble of clarinet, trumpet, trombone, viola and double bass.