Journey To The Center

Musicians huddled around the locker room bulletin board in the basement of Orchestra Hall. Anton squeezed through to get a closer look. Several of his colleagues winced when they saw him. A few patted his shoulder with suppressed chuckles. He quickly scanned the repertoire posted for next season, hoping against hope he would not see what he dreaded. On the list was The Nutcracker during the holidays. That was expected. “Ready to crack some nuts,” his colleagues joked every year. He scanned further down the list; his heart sank. Journey to the Centre. His worst nightmare, and not just four performances this year, but eight. Eight! He knocked his forehead against the locker room wall.

One goddamned note on the triangle, one tiny ping right in the centre of this ninety-minute, one-movement, god-awful symphonic poem that audiences across the world loved and adored. And he had to sit there night after night, season after season, waiting for this one note while his colleagues plodded on without him. He couldn’t walk off stage in the middle of the piece, he had to sit there the whole time. He couldn’t even prop open a magazine on his stand or surreptitiously look at his phone. He’d asked every conductor under whom he’d performed it if he could enter stage right during loud passages in the overly long exposition and exit just before the coda. But no, that would be distracting, he was told, especially since…and they all craned their necks up at him, eyeing his fiery red hair. Even piccoloists, who had to sit through all five movements of Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony with only four notes to play during the fourth movement had it better than he did. They played an exciting, climactic line – the shriek of lightning during the famous thunderstorm. But what did he do? Strike a single note. It was a joke. What was it with audiences these days? Had they no taste? And what about music directors? What was their problem? And the symphony board of trustees, for God’s sake. When he submitted his complaint the third year JC was scheduled, the answer was always the same: “It’s a money maker. Audiences love it.”

And the anxiety of waiting for his entrance! What if he were to fall asleep? He’d half-jokingly asked the harpist to tap him on the shoulder in case he dozed off. He’d take playing the mind-numbing snare drum solo in Ravel’s Bolero a hundred times over if it meant never having to play JC again.

But no, he and all his fellows were humiliated season after season all because ten years ago a percussionist in the New York Phil had stolen the composer-in-residence’s fiancée a month before their wedding. The rumor amongst musicians went that the fiancée, a violinist, subbed at the last minute for a sick section member. The percussionist, entranced the moment she walked on stage, made the moves after the concert (amongst jokes about practicing paradiddles on her heartstrings), and stole her away from up-and-coming composer, Paco Javier. His music was gaining popularity with a wide range of orchestral audiences both young and old, and always featured a full chorus and sometimes a children’s choir, and lots of percussion. But after the violinist broke off the engagement, Javier wrote an interminable tone poem called Journey to the Centre, which featured no percussion except for a single note on the triangle, not even a proper sound-the-alarm-there’s-a-fire clamor. Just one single “ting” in a sea of silence, followed by all hell breaking loose—singers chanting, the strings sawing away until the horse hairs on their bows frayed, the wind section stomping their feet and the brass bellowing and blaring—a cacophony of sound all directed at the lone percussionist who had stolen the composer’s fiancée. At least that’s how Anton perceived it. The piece was a smashing success. And now audiences around the world couldn’t get enough of it. People traveled from city to city to attend live performances. “JC groupies” they were called.

Upon the fifth season of its unparalleled acclaim, on opening night, a TV reporter stood outside Orchestra Hall after the concert interviewing audience members as they streamed out of the auditorium. “What is it about JC that’s so appealing,” she wanted to know, using the now familiar acronym. Beaming men and women, twenty-somethings and grandmas alike answered with giddy smiles, gushing about how alive they felt. “It’s so profound. It gives me chills every time,” one woman exclaimed, her eyes brimming with tears.

Give me a break Anton had fumed, thumbing through his newsfeed looking for anything that wasn’t about the return of JC.

Months later, the National Percussion Association’s annual convention was being held in Chicago at The Palmer House. Convenient for him but embarrassing that it coincided with JC’s ninth return. In the hotel lobby he ran into Petra Ostrovsky, a colleague from the Berlin Philharmonic. They’d dated a few times over the years. Even that great bastion of music had succumbed to this New Age crap. Anton asked Petra if she’d care to help him plan a JC trashing party. They’d invite everyone and make a night of it. Skits, bad jokes, mangled triangles, the whole nine yards.

Petra took a step back from him. “Why would I do that?”

“Because you hate JC.”

Petra pushed the strap of her handbag further up her shoulder. “I might have altered my opinion of it.”

“Don’t tell me you drank the Kool-Aid?”

Petra hesitated, her brown hair frizzing with static electricity in the dryness of the hotel. “Well, if you must know, I attended a performance.”

Anton scoffed. “Have you gone mad?”

Petra held up a hand. “It’s different, Anton. I swear, from the hall it’s different.”

“Yes, I know. You can get up and leave.”

“I didn’t want to. Maybe you wouldn’t either if you opened your mind a little.”

Anton wondered what he’d ever seen in her. “No thanks. I have better things to do with my nights off,” he said, turning on his heel and striding away.

During cocktail hour that evening percussionists congregated in the lounge. Anton saw Petra across the room and turned to avoid acknowledging her. He ordered a scotch and soda from the bar, grabbed a bag of pretzels and headed over to a group of friends sitting in a booth.

“I hate to ruin a perfectly good conversation about snares, but you won’t believe what Ostrovsky said to me this afternoon.”

“My room number is 516?” asked Boris, a hulking timpanist from the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Ignoring him, Anton continued. “She said I should attend a JC performance.”

The Minneapolis timpanist grimaced. “That’s insane.” She swirled the ice in her glass and took a swig. Anton admired the vehemence with which she crunched the cubes between her prominent jaws.

Donald from Seattle set down his glass. “I’ve been to one.”

They all turned to look at him, all but Donald’s colleague who sat quietly by his side. She wore a long, blond braid over her shoulder. Anton didn’t like her vibes. Sure enough, she chimed in.

“So have I,” she said. Anton hadn’t met her before and wondered where she’d come from. Recent conservatory graduate?

“Are you both mad?” Anton asked.

“No,” Seattle said. “We were curious. It’s been a sensation for years. We wanted to know why.”

Anton shook his head and looked from one to the other. “Why inflict pain on yourselves?”

The woman looked down at her hands, a faint smile on her face that Anton found irritating. She spoke in an ethereal, sweet tone. “You have no idea what it sounds like from the auditorium, especially from up in the nosebleeds.” Anton understood she was referring to the highest seats in the gallery where the acoustics blended in perfect balance.

Jesus Christ! Had Javier written some kind of hypnotizing spell into the score that it could affect even percussionists? Had they no shame? Anton’s father, who was also a percussionist, had never complained about having to sit through the piece, but then he’d only played it for two seasons before he retired. Anton had auditioned for his father’s position right out of music school and won it. He had played all the traps—toys, percussionists called them—whistles, triangles, tambourines, aluminum cigar tubes filled with rice, maracas, sand blocks, rattles, castanets, on and on—and all the drums—snares, tom-toms, bass, all except the timpani, which was usually played by the principal.

“But Dad, you don’t know what it’s like,” Anton had complained during the fifth season of JC acclaim. He was visiting at his parents’ condo overlooking the slate blue waters of Lake Michigan.

“I sit there night after night doing nothing. It’s a waste of my talent. I didn’t spend hours in a practice room for…” He mimicked striking a triangle.  “It’s ludicrous.”

His father had simply shrugged. “You should play your part well regardless. Do you, Anton? Do you give that one note your all?”

Anton jiggled the ice in his glass. “I need a change of scenery. And a better drink. Anyone up for Brian Blade at the Jazz Showcase? He’s here for one night only.” Everyone checked their watches or took out their cell phones. “Nobody? Your loss, guys. You’re missing some fine sticks.”

A half-hour later Anton arrived at the Showcase in time for the ten o’clock set and took a small table left of the stage. The room accommodated several dozen tables and just about every one of them offered a good view, but only half were filled. This place should be packed, he thought and shook his head at the shame of it. He ordered a double, the first of his two-drink minimum. The musicians walked on stage, tooted their horns and adjusted their neck straps. Blade sat behind his traps gleaming silver under the spotlight, adjusted his seat, joked with his band members, and took a swig of his drink. When they were ready he gave the count.

As soon as the band started playing, Anton relaxed, floating away on a river of syncopated beats that loosened every crick in his body. The table to his right remained empty until the middle of the second number. Latecomers should be seated at intermission, he thought, scowling at them. Not everyone in their party could fit around the small table, so the attractive young woman with chin-length, ebony hair turned to Anton and pointed silently to a chair at his table. He half rose, gesturing. No wedding band or diamond ring on her hand, he noticed.

After a smattering of applause, Blade said a few words about the next piece and started in on an upbeat tempo of polyrhythms. The young intruders talked noisily, except for the woman at his table. He watched as she tapped her toe and moved with the complexity, not at all thrown by Blade’s changing meters. Anton wanted to tell her friends to shut up but refrained lest she take offense. During Blade’s solo, however, she tapped one of her friend’s shoulder and put a finger to her lips. Thank God, Anton thought. But soon her friends were talking loudly again.

Anton considered moving to another table. But that would mean losing a chance to chat this woman up during intermission. Who were these friends of hers? And who was that guy? Were they music students? No, they wouldn’t be so disrespectful. The guy at their table leaned over to the three women and said loudly, “Whose idea was this anyway?” The three women turned and pointed.

“Hey, Michiko,” the guy yelled. “No offence, but this music sucks.”

The woman frowned, leaned in and said something to her companions. A moment later the four of them stood, gathered their things, and left, leaving her behind. She mouthed, “I’m so sorry,” to Anton, hand to her chest, then scooted over to the table they had just vacated.

Anton was delighted by this development. “Would you care to join me again?” he asked. At age thirty-five, he wondered if he was getting too old for such young women. Twenty-one? Twenty-two? Red and blue stage lights glinted off her glossy black hair.

She smiled, picked up her glass, then moved back to his table. “Bad idea, dragging them here. I’m Michiko,” she said, offering her hand. Anton engulfed hers in his callused one, hoping it wouldn’t repulse her. He was self-conscious about shaking hands with non-musicians. Her grip was firm and silky-smooth. Not a musician, then. Unless a singer? She swayed to the rhythm, moving like undulating seaweed. He barely heard a beat of Blade’s relaxed complexity.

At intermission the noise level rose as people began chatting.

“You seem to know Blade’s work,” Anton said, raising his voice over the din.

Michiko shook her head. “I don’t. I just love jazz, but he’s great. So fluid.”

“You’re a musician?” Anton asked.

“No, grad student at the Art Institute. Art history.”

“Fantastic,” Anton said. “I work across the street.”

“On Michigan Avenue?”

Anton picked up his empty glass and slid an ice cube into his mouth, sucking the film of scotch from it. He bragged out of habit, trying to impress potential dates with his status as a CSO musician. Usually, it gave him a thrill, seeing women’s eyes light up with interest. But tonight, hearing Blade’s performance, he didn’t feel like bragging. Plus, there was something about her, how she sat and listened. He respected her. She was looking at him. He jiggled his glass then set it down in the wet circle on his cocktail napkin. “Um, yeah, Orchestra Hall.”

Michiko tilted her head and smiled, an adorable dimple forming in her right cheek. “Really? What, like, in the orchestra?”

Anton nodded. “So, why art history?”

The dimple deepened, sending a thrill through Anton’s fingers. He wanted to reach out and stroke it.

“Uh-uh. You first. What instrument do you play?” she asked.

Triangle, he thought, morbidly. “Percussion,” he said.

“Fantastic! I used to run around my parents’ living room to Khachaturian’s Sabre Dance when I was a kid. Loved the drums.”

“Fun piece,” Anton said, lightening up. “Terrific xylophone part.”

“Right! Not like Journey to the Centre. Are you the guy who plays the triangle?”

Anton froze.

She leaned toward him, her silky black hair framing her face like a swishing curtain. “So, what’s it about? I heard it’s spiritual or something, like, I don’t know, woowoo kind of stuff, people having visions and all that.”

Anton slumped. The evening had been going so well. Could he never get away from JC? He expelled a sharp breath. “Yeah. There’s a meaning. Javier sticking it to percussionists right up their you know whats.”

Michiko sat straight and grimaced. “Yikes! How so?”

Anton figured everyone had heard the jilted love story by now and was surprised she hadn’t since she knew the piece. After he finished telling her about the stolen fiancée, Michiko fiddled with her red plastic swizzle stick, looking thoughtful.

“I’m not so sure,” she said.

“Not so sure about what?”

“I mean, the climax of the piece at the very centre, the triangle. It was a triangulated relationship. Javier made it into a pun! It’s brilliant! But there’s a feeling of …I don’t know. Not frustration or bitterness or even anger. Not at that point. When I hear it I feel nothing but …”

Anton put his head in his hand and scrunched his red hair. “Don’t say it!”

“Say what?”

Anton raised his head. “That it’s mystical.”

Michiko’s dimple was missing. Instead, faint lines furrowed her flawless brow. “Yeah, maybe, like awe and love?”

Anton looked around for the server. He could use another drink. “It’s a fucking insult,” he said. “Javier makes every damned percussionist pay for one guy’s indiscretion, and now we’re all the butt of his joke.”

Michiko tossed the swizzle stick on the table. “Wow. You sure take it personally. It has nothing to do with you. I mean, even now that I know the story, it doesn’t sound like Javier’s ‘sticking it to percussionists’ as you say.” She made air quotes. “Maybe he really loved his fiancée and just wanted her to be happy. Maybe it’s about forgiveness. I think the story makes JC even more profound.”

Anton shook his head, dreading all the JC performances head of him this season, the first one being tomorrow night. It was like being in a dentist’s chair wondering if the appointment would ever come to an end. “You wouldn’t think that if you had to sit through night after night of it eight years in a row. My talent is wasted. I should be like Blade here. He’s living his art. What am I doing? Nothing.”

Michiko leaned towards him. “But it’s not nothing. You’re such an integral part. It’s like all transgressions are forgiven with that one single note. You make it happen.”

Anton smirked. “Seriously? You sound like my father.”

Michiko shrugged. “Maybe he’s right. Do you know what a Zen circle is?”

Anton shook his head. “Can’t say that I do.”

“There are some great examples at the Art Institute. It’s where a Zen master paints a huge circle on the floor with a kind of mop. He perfectly embodies the moment. It’s sensuous and beautiful.”

Anton nodded. “Sounds like an acquired taste.”

“It is. Maybe that’s what Journey is all about—capturing one perfect moment, one perfect note. When does anyone get a chance to attain perfection? You say you hate the piece because you’re bored, but I think it’s fabulous that millions of people have acquired a taste for… simplicity.”

“You mean mediocrity.”

Michiko stared at him. He couldn’t tell what she was thinking. He wanted to reach across the table and run a finger across that incredibly smooth cheek, to brush the faint hairs above those rosebud lips. He wanted to see that dimple again. He wanted to make her understand what it was like for him, but she was reaching around the back of her chair for her blazer and rising from her seat.

He extended his hand across the table. “You’re leaving?”

She shouldered the strap of her small black purse. “It’s late. I’m tired.”

“They’re just getting warmed up. The second set is always the best.”

The band members drifted back on stage. Anton stood, threw some bills on the table, and followed her out of the nightclub.

She stood at the curb. “I called an Uber. Thanks. It was nice meeting you.”

Anton shoved his hands deep into his pockets, frustrated. “Listen, I’m playing JC tomorrow night. I could leave a ticket for you at the box office. Maybe we could meet up afterward.” He hoped this was true. He wasn’t sure whether his complimentary tickets extended to JC performances.

Michiko shook her head. “I think I’ll pass, thanks. Besides, knowing you hate the piece would kind of ruin it for me.”

A sedan with a blue sign in the windshield pulled up at the curb. Anton didn’t want her to get in. “I’d love to see those circles you told me about.”

She climbed into the back seat and looked up at him before closing the door, her lips a straight line across her heart-shaped face. “I’m sure you can find them. If you care to.”

As the car drove away, Anton kicked a newspaper dispenser, the headline of the arts section touting, “JC Returns!”

The next day at the convention, Anton begged favors of his colleagues to please sub for him that evening. No one was willing. Finally, he asked Boris. “I’ll pay you double.”

“Triple,” Boris said.

“Ah, come on, man.” Anton hesitated. “Fine.”

“She must be pretty hot,” Boris teased.

Anton walked four blocks to Orchestra Hall, weaving amongst tourists and locals on their lunch break. Outside the symphony centre a couple of flutists played duets, City of Chicago street-performer permits dangling from their necks. He took the elevator up to the administrative office only to find that complimentary tickets unclaimed six hours before a performance were released to the box office for sale to the public.

“Tonight’s sold out,” the matronly woman in the box office said, shaking her head behind the glass. “Has been for weeks. Except I do have one box seat left.”

“How much?”

“That’ll be four hundred ninety-nine dollars.”

“What? That’s robbery.”

He pictured Michiko, her slender body swaying to the beat, that dimple in her cheek. Shaking his head, he dug into his pocket and pulled out his wallet.

“You must be a real fan,” the woman said as he handed over his credit card.

“Oh, yeah, huge.” Anton glowered.

“Enjoy your Journey,” the woman replied, handing him back his card and his ticket.

That evening, Anton entered the Orchestra Hall lobby and squeezed his way over to the elevators that would take him up to the gallery floor. He needed to swap tickets with someone, but everyone seemed to be a couple. It would be a hard sell, splitting up two people on a date, but he had to get to where the acoustics were best.

The first few twosomes he tried were all young and gave him nervous looks, shaking their heads. Finally, he spotted a couple who looked to be about his parents’ age. He approached them, hoping this wasn’t their first time at a JC performance, thinking they might be more willing to split up. “Oh no,” the husband replied, patting his wife’s arm. “I wouldn’t be separated from my wife during the Journey if you paid me a hundred bucks.”

“Oh, but I will,” Anton replied, shoving the box seat ticket at the man, and pulling out his wallet. The man swiftly put his arm around his wife and bustled her into the elevator.

With slumped shoulders, Anton turned and made his way over to the entrance for the box seats when he felt a tug at his elbow. It was a young man with a mop of curly brown hair. “I overheard you want to trade tickets?”

“Yes! You have a nosebleed?” Anton asked.

The young man looked startled and put a hand to his face.

“Sorry, I mean you have a gallery ticket?”

“Yeah, right here.”

After they traded, the young man whooping with glee, Anton edged his way back towards the elevators when he spotted the Seattle percussionists entering the car on the left. He ducked and waited to catch the second elevator. Upon exiting onto the gallery floor, he looked around until he spotted them handing their ticket to an usher a couple of doors down. His seat was in the aisle closest to the elevator. Good. He hoped they hadn’t noticed him. With his height and fiery hair, he was hard to miss.

Anton had never been in the gallery. When he was a boy, his father’s complimentary tickets had always been for the balcony or main floor. Upon entering the gallery seating area, Anton was seized by vertigo. The slope of rows was so acute he wondered that no one had fallen to their death in the many years the hall had been operating. He searched the rows anxiously and had just spotted the Seattle duo when an usher asked for his ticket.

“You’re right up front, sir. This way.”

Anton hesitated. “Could I have a program, please.” He held it open by the side of his face to mask his profile and unmistakable hair, inhaling the inky smell while he clung to the handrail. When he got to his seat he slumped down, eager for the lights to dim.

The first violinist walked out on stage and the orchestra tuned. After a pause, the maestro came out and bowed. Anton had forgotten what it was like to be in the audience—that moment of anticipation.

As the conductor raised his arms, the musicians raised their instruments, all eyes on him. Maestro brought his hands together as if he was holding a bowl of air, then flew his arms outward. The musicians jumped into a frenzy of motion and sound. Anton had always thought that move was rather theatrical. He resented being the only one on stage with nothing to do, but from up here it gave him a different sense, as if Maestro held the entire piece between his hands and was releasing it like a flock of doves that flew skyward on a wave of sound. The effect was hair raising. He snuck a peek over his shoulder at the Seattle couple several rows back. They sat riveted, hands clasped on the shared armrest.

When the swirling cascade of textures thinned out one by one, only the string basses were left as they carried a haunting, melancholy tune. But from up in the gallery, he heard a counter melody he’d never noticed before. He checked the program, wondering if this was a different version. Had there been a last-minute update in the score? As Anton listened, focusing on the surprising undercurrents, the way the flutes burbled under the cellos, each playing the opposite of what they usually did, the flutes in their lowest possible registers, the cellos in their highest, he felt chills as the children’s choir began to meld with them in tuneless humming. The piece was unrecognizable. Had he tuned out that much during performances?

He looked at his watch, astonished to see they were approaching the halfway mark and that the triangle solo was coming up. How could this be? He grew hot and wanted to remove his jacket but dared not disturb his seat mates. Sweating, he kept his eyes on Boris. Pick up your triangle, man! Get ready! But Boris sat there stone faced looking bored. It was coming, the tidal wave, the tsunami of sound was about to crash over him, and he wasn’t paying attention. Boris, wake up man! Wake up!

At the last second, Boris reached for his triangle, held it up and as all sound ceased, struck it with a fierce wham that pierced the silence like a scream in the night. The hairs on the back of Anton’s neck stood on end. He’d never played the note like that. And even though he knew the frustration behind Boris’s execution, the effect wasn’t anger, just as Michiko had said. All sound in the hall ceased, as if the audience had taken a collective breath and was holding it, waiting to exhale. Prickles of sensation ran over Anton’s skin. Around him people held their hands in front of them as if they were holding an invisible ball, like Maestro had done. They moved their hands back and forth as if energy pulsated between them. Feeling like a fool, Anton raised his hands and did the same, testing the air for whatever it was these people around him were feeling. And then he felt it too. Like magnets pulling at each other. He exhaled with a long sigh.

By the end of the performance, he was on his feet cheering bravo! with the rest of the audience. He felt a little crazy surrendering to this preposterous euphoria, while another part of him couldn’t care less. He imagined running across the street to the Art Institute, banging on the doors to find Michiko as if that’s where she lived, and telling her he understood. He understood now!

As the crowd streamed out of the gallery to the elevators, Anton drifted on a purr of contentment as he flowed among them, feeling included rather than isolated.

“I’m so glad you came, Anton.” It was Donald and the blond with the braid from Seattle.

Anton felt heat at the tips of his ears, as if he’d been caught before realizing they weren’t judging him. They were beaming at him. The woman, he finally remembered her name, Suzanne. She asked, “What did you think? Pretty incredible, huh?”

Anton nodded sheepishly. “Is it always that good?”

She nodded. “Pretty much, though it’s always different, depending on the percussionist. Boris may have tried to ruin it, but he was…smashing!” She grinned and they all groaned and laughed.

The next day, first thing in the morning, Anton went to the administration office to request a complimentary ticket for that night’s performance. He slipped a note inside the envelope, saying, “I’ve been an ass. I listened from the audience last night. I get it.—A.” Maybe she’d look him up, maybe not. If they were meant to meet again, he had faith that they would. He wrote Michiko’s name on the envelope, followed by “grad student” in parentheses and dropped it off at the School of the Art Institute administrative office.

“Sir, we have over seven-hundred graduate students. Without a last name, there’s not much I can do,” said the receptionist.

“She’s an art history major, if that helps. Please. It’s a ticket to JC. I want her to have it.”

The woman’s face softened. “That does narrow it down a bit. I can see if the advisor of that department knows a Michiko.”

That evening in the Orchestra Hall locker room, Anton’s colleagues ribbed him for missing opening night. “Quite a ringer you got there with that Boris,” the first violinist said. Anton shook his head good naturedly. Musicians.

He took out his new triangle he had purchased that day along with the new metal striker with an ebony handle. He wanted a fresh start with a triangle that hadn’t stored up his accumulated resentment over the years. This one had a sweet, penetrating tone unlike the indifferent tone of his old one. He carried the triangle and striker upstairs and walked onstage to arrange them on the small, carpet-lined table by his chair next to the elegantly carved harp. Both the stage lights and house lights were on. Audience members were trickling into the hall to find their seats. Anton raised his hand against the glare and scanned the rows, then went back downstairs to wait, nervous excitement building in his chest.

#

All were onstage. Anton was alert. He wondered whether the music would affect him the same way it did when he was in the audience. Maestro raised his hands in his signature gesture, and they were off. But this time, Anton didn’t feel excluded. He listened for the textures he had heard the previous night. They weren’t as prevalent, but now he knew what to listen for. The harpist played her glissandos; the brass bellowed and alternatively caressed their harmonies. When the children hummed tunelessly Anton’s anticipation grew.

They were approaching the moment.

Maestro raised the maelstrom and with one savage slash through the air all sound ceased. He stared at Anton. Anton was ready, his new triangle held aloft, glinting in the stage lights. He waited, letting the energy build in silence, then with exquisite care, deftly struck metal upon metal. The vibration resounded through his fingertips, his hand, up his arm. He dipped the triangle slowly up and down, sending perfectly balanced waves of silver lightness over his colleagues, over the audience, filling the hall with one perfect ting!

Anton closed his eyes as the tone expanded, grew, then faded into silence. When he opened them, sheet music on the first violinist’s stand fluttered in the collective sigh.