This song grew out of a Facebook exchange. Rob Hanstock said that if I wrote a poem about an anechoic chamber, he would set it to music. I responded with a short lyric and promised that if he did set it to music I would perform it at the next Malvern Spoken Word meeting. This is the result. The piano part in the recording is midi-synthesised from Rob's written score. Maybe some day we'll perform it together at the piano.
James, the seventh Earl of Powick, built himself an anechoic chamber where, when under stress, he'd retire to convalesce. "Leave outside the noise of battle. Leave the mindless social prattle. Let the dogs and children riot. Here is silence. Here is quiet. "Still as any stalactite I shall sit all through the night, conscious only of my breath separating life from death. "Silent and alone partaking of the void of my own making, time may tune my longing ears to the Music of the Spheres".