Dance, Music, Theater: 250 Anecdotes and Stories

A Sample: 1) Some lawyers and judges in England tend not to think highly of music, or of composers, conductors, and musicians. Once, conductor Thomas Beecham was at a party where it was mentioned that a young man was studying to be a musician. A judge at the party asked, "Why doesn't he go into some honest trade?" At a court hearing, one of Beecham's lawyers mentioned the "musical profession," and a judge asked, "What's that? You don't call music a profession, do you?" On yet another occasion in court, after learning that Beecham had spent a great deal of money on music, the judge asked, "What is the good of that?" 2) Actor David Garrick had a reputation for being tight with his money. One day, he discovered that he had dropped a guinea while out for a walk, so he and Samuel Foote looked for it. While looking, Mr. Foote murmured, "Where can it have gone?" Mr., Garrick replied irritably, "To the devil, I think!" Remembering Mr. Garrick's tightness, Mr. Foote joked, "Ah, Davy, you alone could make a guinea go further than anybody else." 3) Keith Moon, drummer of The Who, enjoyed pranking people. He used to have a friend go into a clothing store and request a pair of trousers made of very strong material. Mr. Moon would then enter the store and offer to help the friend test the strength of the material. He and the friend would each grab a trouser leg and rip the pair of trousers in half, and the friend would complain to the salesclerk about the shoddy material of the trousers. Then came the masterstroke: A one-legged actor would enter the store and say that he wanted to buy half a pair of trousers.