Pindar is Dead is a short scherzo for clarinet and piano written in 1968 for Alan Hacker who gave it its first performance in London that year. Pindar is Dead is from Louis MacNeice and the poem expresses disillusionment at the banal activities of an Easter bank holiday. Dalby's music is simple and lighthearted and includes some of the effects with which Alan Hacker was experimenting at that time. The composer's use of the title refers goodnaturedly to his own disillusionment at the August bank holiday which he spent writing it.