Nothing to do with music, but we can’t resist! It may even inspirirational, so we can add ‘Death by a Piece of Music!’Summer 1939, and the French art dealer Ambroise Vollard was being driven back to Paris by his chauffeur, Marcel. Vollard was the leading dealer of the early 20th century.
He gave Picasso and Cézannne their first one-man shows.
He was dozing, when the car crashed. The impact causing a small bronze by the sculptor Aristide Maillol, an artist loved by Vollard and loathed by Picasso, to shoot forward and hitting Vollard in the side of the neck, fracturing his cervical vertebrae.
Vollard died later that night in a Versailles hospital - killed - literally, by a work of art.The sculptor Aristide Maillol died in a car accident five years later. Picasso, who automatically interpreted any coincidences or unacceptable occurrences as signs of an evil destiny at work, took Vollard’s death as proof that he was surrounded by evil forces.
He swore never again to allow his own chauffeur, also called Marcel, to drive him, travelling by train to Paris to attend Vollard’s funeral.