The Phantom Concert Hall...A Walk in the Park

It's late, the sun has set, and you're walking across the park as a shortcut. The shadows stretch out before you, forming bizarre shapes on the ground, sometimes seeming to swallow you up. Wait a minute...are those footsteps following you? You look over your shoulder...did someone just slip into a shadowy corner? You quicken your pace...

Your heart begins to thump, and you hear a voice...or did you?...did it call your name? Or was it your imagination? Why is the park so empty? Why do the lights not seem to illuminate much? The very air seems to absorb the luminescence, and objects very near the lampposts are wreathed in shadow.

Something flaps overhead, and you're still convinced you're being followed. For whatever reason, your normal instincts to find out what's going on are gone; you just want to get out of there. There's fear in the very air itself. You're breathing it in, quicker and quicker. You break into a run, and know full well that someone is behind you, running to keep up, but you don't dare look.

Finally, you reach the street, and stop as the traffic goes by. You look back in the park, and just barely catch a glimpse of someone (or something?) stepping behind a tree. Or maybe it's a trick of the shadows.

This little vignette was inspired by this piece, a work by American avant-garde composer Charles Ives.