[NetBehaviour] Sad and Hopeful Song for Ossi the Cat

[Alan Sondheim]

Sad and Hopeful Song for Ossi the Cat

Ossi
http://www.alansondheim.org/ossi1.jpg
http://www.alansondheim.org/forossi.mp3
http://www.alansondheim.org/ossi0.jpg
http://www.alansondheim.org/ossinow1.jpg

Guzheng
http://www.alansondheim.org/insts01.jpg

The guzheng is a Chinese zither, plucked on the right-hand side,
which is tuned with both pegs and bridges. The left-hand side is
'out of tune,' and the strings are pressed down on the left to
raise the pitch on the right. Think of the left-hand side as a
support structure, an abject cacophony of potential sound, an
existence in the depths, played when the soul is deeper than
scales and perfect tuning. (I play back and forth, among the
fields in this piece.) But the left is also, I think, the field
of spirit, of universal cosmology, of dark matter, and here I
play for our cat, Ossi Oswalda, who is doing poorly now, but
still with us, after ten seizures over four days three months
ago, and those numbers are meaningless as we stay close to her
and hope for the best. The piece is a threnody of hope, listen,
(she did, but then she had no choice!), thanks.