Classical corner

Here are two of my favorite movements from The Planets, an orchestral suite that is the best known work of Gustav Holst. The first is the stirring "Mars, the Bringer of War", and the second is the mysterious, hauntingly beautiful (almost Twilight Zone-ish) "Neptune, the Mystic".





Note I first heard The Planets back in the 1980s. It was during Reagan's first term, and, in spite of Reagan's tough stance against the Soviet Union, I did not anticipate seeing communism dismantled in my lifetime. "Neptune, the Mystic" formed the soundtrack for the last scene of a story I contemplated writing (although I never did). The yarn featured a liberal do-gooder journalist who hears of a dark right-wing conspiracy against the U.S. government, and he throws himself into investigating the plot; however, as he gets deeper into the weeds, he finds that the whole thing is a lie, a massive disinformation plan cooked up by the Russians, with obvious help from inside the U.S. government (and this would have been a time when there were a few liberals, including our hero, to whom personal integrity and honesty mattered more than ideology). As his fellow "investigators" become revealed as communist operatives, and as it becomes increasingly clear that they are suspicious of his reliability, the journalist realizes that his changes of survival are shrinking rapidly. In desperation, he decides to turn to an old family friend - a senior official with State Dept. Intelligence, or FBI Counterintelligence (something like that). The official professes great interest in what the journalist has uncovered, and arranges to meet him at night in a Washington park.

In the last scene, it has been snowing, and the street lamps throw little pools of bright light on the ground, punctuating the darkness. The journalist arrives and waits, nervously, for the official to arrive. The latter does finally materialize out of the darkness, walks up to the journalist and embraces him in an avuncular sort of way. They proceed to walk through the park (this is where I can hear the eerie, somewhat sinister music playing in my head as the soundtrack behind the conversation), and after the journalist gives a brief description of the plot he has discovered, the official picks up the thread of the conversation and, to the surprise of the journalist, begins to fill in numerous details of the disinformation scheme. As they stroll slowly along, the journalist finds, to his consternation, that the official is not simply explaining the scheme, he appears to be doing so with enthusiasm, defending it, oddly bragging about it. All the time they have been walking, the official has been stealthily guiding the journalist to a secluded section of the park that abuts a service road. Distracted and panicked by the realization that the official is actually one of the masterminds of the Soviet plot, the journalist does not notice that they have suddenly come upon a black limousine parked in the road. The official smiles broadly at the journalist, takes him gently by the arm and leads him to the car. He opens the rear door, and there, siting in the gloom of the back seat, are two stolid, shadowy figures. The official offers some final words - something along the lines of, "I have, really, always been fond of you and your family. But surely you can see that there's no place for sentimentality in a war zone. I am genuinely sorry". The journalist, in a kind of trance brought on by the hopelessness of his situation, gets into the car. The official closes the door and begins walking back through the park. The car pulls slowly away, carrying the journalist to his death.

In any event, it's interesting how a musical piece can trigger the emotions and the intellect, and spur the creative process along lines that can surprise even one's self.