Korridorium

♫ Sonochronic Contradictions ♫

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I enter the corridor—the orchestra has already begun—and hasten into the hall. To reach my seat, I must squeeze through the otherwise fully occupied second row. As I do, the music crashes against me like a jungle of incoherent tones, following no recognisable form. Must I really endure this? “Avant-garde”—that subtitle on the programme should have made me suspicious. I truly wish to leave, yet I am as if paralysed, steadily losing the sensation of my own body as the music expands. It begins to flow between the intervals of the accustomed semitones—not merely into quarter-tones, but “centitones” and “millitones.” To the untrained ear, it is torture; but for me, within me, something has shifted. I now perceive with mounting interest the various musical forms bustling within the sound.

It is astonishing: these sound-figures live and move freely through the world of tones, drifting apart and drawing near to one another. I realise with amazement that the two dimensions of this world are, on one hand, pitch, and on the other, the timbres arising from harmonic overtones. Every living creature in this sound universe possesses its own colouration, even if some are adept at camouflaging themselves.

One of these sound-creatures seems very close to me, and suddenly the realization hits: That’s me! In this world of vibrations and frequencies, I possess my own body; I am part of this acoustic habitat! When one of the sound-beings nudges me and I feel a sharp pain, I learn that I can change my musical form and move through this jungle of tones, through the dense musical vegetation. I can even absorb small sound-figures into my own form—as if I were strolling through a garden, snacking on tasty-looking apples or raspberries.

A deep growl makes my heart skip a beat: a hunter is prowling the jungle, searching for prey with its whirring sound-tentacles. I flee, but the hungry creature has already spotted me. I hide my sound-body in the musical vegetation of our habitat, but my camouflage is useless. I narrowly escape a searching tentacle by climbing higher. I am limited, however; I manage to rise a few octaves, but then the sounds begin to thin out in the high registers. The predator rumbles restlessly back and forth directly beneath me in the low registers, until a tiny melodic fragment falls from the vegetation I’m clinging to and betrays me. With a piercing arpeggio, one of its tentacles reaches me and digs deep into the sound-pattern of my flesh. The greedy growl pulls me down toward it, octave by octave…

I let out a death cry.

The music dies away. A few violins play on, but the conductor has turned towards me, and the entire audience is staring. “I am sorry,” I mumble, standing up and pushing through the row to flee the hall.

I can still hear the conductor calling out a bar number to his orchestra to resume the piece. The music rises once more. But I run on, further and further, without collecting my coat from the cloakroom—simply away from here, into the open air.

There is no music here. The street noises are refreshing, washing over my ears like a welcome downpour. Everything is a rush of cars and roaring motorcycles; in the distance, I hear a siren, and above me, an aeroplane. I come to a halt in the midst of this wonderful clamour. A roar draws closer—the deep growl of a powerful engine. A bus thunders at great speed along the street, bearing down on the spot where I stand. I face it, arms flung wide to the sky, thanking the heavens for my rescue…

Based on Olaf Stapledon’s “A World of Sound” (1936).

Reading of the original short story: