Chapman walked in to find Keats standing amid piles of musical scores which sprawled over table and chairs.
“Have you joined a band?” Chapman asked dubiously.
“No! This is all for the prize!” Keats tripped over a teetering pile of what turned out to be the complete score of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, scattering the pages everywhere.
“The prize. What prize?” Chapman was even more dubious. Bitter experience had taught him that Keats and prizes were a very bad combination. Keats was always convinced that he was in with a chance no matter what the competition might be – cake making, dancing, painting. Each time he threw himself into the fray, regardless of talent or skills. And every time he was disappointed.
“Some eccentric American is the new sponsor of the Concert Hall and they are holding a fancy dress gala in his honour. He has promised a prize of £10,000 to the winning costume. But there is a catch…”
“A catch. What kind of catch?”
“You have to dress as a composer whose last name starts with a B.”
Chapman looked at the piles of scores. He saw Berlioz, Bliss, Bizet, Bruckner, Brahms as well as Beethoven.
“Have you chosen?”, he asked Keats.
“Everyone will go as Beethoven. Biggest name and highly recognisable. So I need to pick one who is famous but not an obvious pick. I’ve narrowed it down to either Berlioz or Bruckner. Both very well known but not the first name you would think of. The problem is that Bruckner was a plain unassuming man so I will probably get lost in the crowd. So Berlioz it is then!”
Chapman looked on as Keats put a large brown wig which covered his head and most of his forehead as well. He picked up a red and black frock coat which the cat had been sleeping on, leaving it crumpled and covered in cat hair. After a desultory attempt to remove some of the hair, Keats pulled it on and quickly and sloppily tied a cravat around his neck.
“How do I look?”, he asked.
“Er, messy”
“But am I messy enough? You know what these artistic French people are like!”
Pausing only to apply some Pernod as aftershave Keats swept out of the room. “I’ll see you later”, he said as he ran down the stairs.
A few hours later Keats stormed back in.
Chapman looked at him, “Did your messy Berlioz not win then?”
Keats sighed. “No, I lost. To a neater Bruckner.”
Mark O'Neill 