The double bass isn’t many people’s favourite musical instrument.

Instrument? It’s more of an encumberment and an embarrassment, according to the lone character in Patrick Süskind’s intriguing play, The Double Bass.

The quirky show now running at Sandton’s Auto & General Theatre on the Square won’t be to everybody’s taste either, but I really enjoyed it.

It was written in German and translated by Michael Hofmann, and actor Pieter Bosch Botha delivers a convincing accent as he plays the lonely musician confined in his soundproofed apartment as he prepares for his evening’s work at the opera.

The fact that he’s a state employee who will never be made redundant from his civil service job will be galling for local musicians whose orchestras are permanently dicing with financial ruin, but that’s a mere aside.

Botha is an absolute virtuoso in the role, talking us through his life as it becomes clear that this man with a bass also carries emotional baggage that is equally cumbersome. He blames the instrument – as it lies there dominating the room with its unfazed silence – for his failure to rise in social stature and his failure with women.

He heaps the blame for his own inadequacies on the instrument he both loves and hates, opening up his emotions as he reveals his undeclared love for the soprano who he feels soars far above his lowly status.

Botha’s downtrodden musician could be any and every little man in society, the unseen street sweeper or dustbin man he talks of, unappreciated and hidden away. Just as he in hidden in the orchestra pit, seen but not heard, and underpinning society without ever being given the starring role.

It’s an intense but intensely enjoyable performance, with Botha proving erudite and amusing, emotional and practical, most likeable and yet almost pitiable. He guides us through the composers of old and touches on the politics of Europe, all the time exploring more of his own character through the stories he tells of others.

The set designed by Denis Hutchinson uses a clever backdrop of sheet music to create a small and intimate room where Botha frets and lolls as he debates the hierarchy of talent. When his years of simmering discontent boil over he threatens anarchy in the only way he knows – to become a voice of protest in a sea of music. We kind of hope he will put his threat into action, but we suspect he never will.

It’s a touching, elegant play, and I came away feeling both entertained and educated. DM

The Double Bass runs until March 14 at Sandton’s Auto & General Theatre on the Square.

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