Barred From Plane, Violinist Plays Bach on Tarmac

When US Airways wouldn't let a classically trained violinist bring his violin aboard a plane, he responded in appropriate fashion: He played Bach on the tarmac in protest. More precisely, Zach de Pue of the trio Times for Three played Bach's Prelude from the Sonata in E Major BWV 1006, writes Michael Ballaban at Jalopnik, who calls it "perhaps the most beautiful form of complaint to an airplane I have ever heard."

As the IndyStar explains, de Pue and bandmate Nicolas Kendall were trying to fly from North Carolina to Arkansas for a festival when the plane's crew told them they couldn't board with their instruments as carry-ons. Informed they'd have to stow their violins under the plane instead, the pair decided to skip the flight. Turns out, the FAA says airlines should allow violins as carry-ons, and a US Airways spokesperson subsequently apologized, got them on a different flight, and wished them well at the festival. (More Time for Three stories.)