Following an approach similar to that previously explored by Prokofiev and Britten, the American composer Nathaniel Stookey, in the work The Composer Is Dead, offers his own unique presentation of the instruments which make up an orchestra. In this partnership with the popular children’s storyteller Lemony Snicket, endowed with a disconcerting black humour running throughout, Stookey has created this delicious amusing piece, in the style of a police investigation, during which the narrator-detective questions the suspects to a crime that the title of the piece suggests. The suspects, of course are the instruments – which will use musical arguments to defend themselves.