When Matthias’s grandson found him, the old critic was smiling, headphones on, the box empty. The APE files had been replaced by a single text file. It read:
Disc 73 was Karl Böhm’s 1971 Die Zauberflöte . Track 14: “Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen.” The Queen of the Night’s vengeance aria. Deutsche Grammophon Collection -101 CD box set APE-
That night, at 11:57 PM, Matthias poured a Scotch, loaded the APE into foobar2000, and turned his vintage B&W speakers to the red line. When the first high C hit—Köth’s voice like a diamond scalpel—his reading lamp exploded. Glass tinkled. Then silence. When Matthias’s grandson found him, the old critic
