The framing material is alternately sheer and grating, a haze of static, a thick brush through which the piano, slow and steady, occasionally makes itself heard — first some tentative notes, then a hint of a melody, then a sour note to emphasise that all is still not well. The development is not restricted to that solo piano. First of all, it’s odd to think of it as solo piano, since there is so much more going on in the track, but everything else is a noise so primal it seems to come from some other plane.
Yet that noise also changes as time passes, the volume and the brittle metallic intensity rising and falling in waves. This is “Week 20 Nine Project” of Madeleine Cocolas’ ongoing attempt to write an original piece of music each week, last mentioned here in June 2013.
This is the note she wrote when she posted it:
Oh my goodness. Have you seen Gravity yet? If not you should go and see it now. Preferably in 3D. It was so tense that I had worn hot pink lipstick to go see it (nothing special there — I wear hot pink lipstick everywhere), but when I went to the bathroom afterwards I noticed I had smudged it all over my face from holding my hands against my face. And that stuff doesn’t really come off very easily.
Anyhow, here’s my Week 20-Nine Project. I had fun with this one and spent hours manipulating some of Greg’s guitar noodling by slowing it down, reversing it, putting reverb and other effects on it, then I put a simple piano melody over the top. I like the relentless wall of noise that sits behind the piano melody. Maybe I’m still harboring a bit of the tension from Gravity?!
Track originally posted for free download at soundcloud.com/madeleine-cocolas. She’s an Australian composer based in Seattle, Washington. More from her at madeleinecocolas.blogspot.com.