Ah, the Fourth: Freedom, fireworks — and Tchaikovsky

Oh, what a stirring tableau of sight and sound it will be. It always is, standing there with your family, shvitzing in the summer heat with 100,000 fellow shvitzers and standing next to a $1,200 Yeti cooler big enough to be buried in as the fireworks boom and the Austin Symphony reprises its rousing rendition of the “1812 Overture.”

And maybe just about then a little girl will look at her gathered family at this moment of nonpartisan patriotism and ask this question:

“Mommy, Daddy, Creepy Uncle Morty, why do they play that song?”

One among you (preferably not Morty) will perceive a teachable moment. Realizing, however, it’s another teachable moment you’re ill-equipped to teach, you’ll remember you have the complete collected knowledge of humankind in your shorts.

You will — as a modern Austin parent of a kid with a modern Austin kid name — quote Wikipedia as you turn to that little girl and say:

“Zinnia Flapjack, they play that song because it is the Festival Overture in E-flat major, Opus 49, popularly known as the ‘1812 Overture,’ an overture written in 1880 by Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky to commemorate Russia’s defense of its motherland against Napoleon’s invading Grande Armée in 1812.”

And as your mouth is mov- ing, this will waft, unspoken, through your head: “Why are they celebrating the anniversary of America’s birth by playing a song celebrating a Russian victory over some French guys? And how do you pronounce Pyotr?”

At that moment, Zinnia Flapjack will look up at you with eyes expressing confidence in you as the all-knowing font of all that is knowable and eerily echo the words in your head by saying: “Why are they celebrating the anniversary of America’s birth by play- ing a song celebrating a Russian victory over some French guys? And I think you mispronounced Pyotr.”

And, turning to everything you learned in parenting class, you will say, “Zinnia Flapjack, want to play with the Yeti some more?”

Who doesn’t love the “1812 Overture”?

Remember it from the 1960s Puffed Rice commercials with the lyrics, “This is the cereal that’s shot from guns?” I’m