Beneath the Grey

For Piano Trio (9′)

Programme note

“Depression is also smaller than you. Always, it is smaller than you, even when it feels vast. It operates within you, you do not operate within it. It may be a dark cloud passing across the sky but – if that is the metaphor – you are the sky. You were there before it. And the cloud can’t exist without the sky, but the sky can exist without the cloud.” Matt Haig.

‘Beneath the Grey’ is constructed within the traditional ‘arch-shape’ mould; a singular movement that comprises several sections of varying moods and tempos. However, it is also a somewhat personal, and human, journey through a depressed state of mind. Opening with a dark and intense harmonic sequence by way of a gently undulating piano motif, joined later by the pleading and expressive voices of the cello and violin, at first the sky is dark; the clouds are thick, vast, heavy and suffocating. As the piece progresses, there is further melodic development and increasing rhythmic interest as the clouds roll past and life continues to move forwards.

This eventually gives away to a more energetic, pulsing and stormy theme, articulated first through heavy octave motifs from the piano against accompanying pizzicato movement from the strings. But this energy is ‘false’ energy and gradually, as this theme builds, there are more frequent interjections of the first, pleading cantabile theme, constantly shifting through various harmonies. Eventually, this builds to a climactic breaking point with the opening theme becoming more fragmented in the strings. However, instead of building to further darkness, here the clouds finally lift and there is a brief moment of eerie tranquillity, as clearer skies are finally in view, and there is a new weightless energy.

This moment of repose is brief, however, and soon the dark clouds begin to drift across the sky once more. There is a return to the heaviness of the very opening as the first, gently moving piano theme begins again, and the cello and violin present their melancholic melodies with some further harmonic development, before a final, more silent and still interation of the opening.

*World premiere performance given by the Ardentia Trio at Emmanuel Church, Didsbury on 29th March 2025.