Watch this startlingly fast bass performance of "Flight of the Bumblebee"
by David Pescovitz from on (#41TVW)
Davie504 tears his way through the famous orchestral interlude from Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's opera "The Tale of Tsar Saltan" (1899-1900). From Wikipedia:
"Flight of the Bumblebee" is recognizable for its frantic pace when played up to tempo, with nearly uninterrupted runs of chromatic sixteenth notes. It is not so much the pitch or range of the notes that are played that challenges the musician, but simply the musician's ability to move to them quickly enough. Because of this and its complexity, it requires a great deal of skill to perform. Often in popular culture, it is thought of as being notoriously hard to play.