Air on the G String

In 1871, violinist August Wilhelmj arranged the second movement of Bach's third Orchestral Suite for violin and an accompaniment of strings, piano or organ (harmonium).

[1] On the score he wrote auf der G-Saite (on the G string) above the staff for the solo violin, which gave the arrangement its nickname.

In a period that stretched over three decades, and started in 1905, Henry Wood regularly programmed Wilhelmj's arrangement at the London Proms.

The "Air", exclusively for strings and continuo, with its perfect singing in all voices, breathing an unsurpassed "lost to the world", has suffered the most appalling regicide in music: the violinist Wilhelmj converted it to sultry claptrap by setting it as "Aria on the G String", thus vandalising and annihilating both its equilibrated polyphony and delicate atmosphere.

"[6] In the 1977 James Bond film, The Spy Who Loved Me, the piece is used as villain Karl Stromberg feeds his assistant to a shark.

Duke is hired to shoot the G string on his rival's violin in order to humiliate him as he plays same piece at a concert in front of a large audience.

The 2022 anime adaption of the manga "Record of Ragnarok", which depicts famous mythological and historical human figures fighting against the gods of various cultures and religions, used a rendition of this song, referred to as "massacre in the g battlefield" as the entrance theme for Zeus, one of the fighters.