Rhapsody

Once when I was young, I saw a science fiction movie.

The soundtrack was by Rachmaninoff. How did I know it was Rachmaninoff? In the titles, at the end, I saw the name Rachmaninoff. Of course, I didn’t know who Rachmaninov was at the time, but it was the only thing I remembered about the movie. Later, when I was older, I began to listen to Rachmaninoff, but not because I particularly remembered the science fiction movie. It must have been something else.

But then I came across a recording of Rachmaninoff performing his own music. It was a strange feeling, listening to the composer play his own composition, from a distant time. I believe it was recorded in the 1920s. The quality of the recording was poor, the sound was dense with scratches and fog, but there was something essential about it. Something else.

The day of my death, I requested a phonograph and the Rachmaninoff record. I believe it was a piano concerto. The science fiction movie I saw when I was young came back to me, complete. It felt like I was seeing the movie for the first time, but in my final moments, I knew the music by heart. I experienced the film as something new, but heard the music as something else.