No World Concerto Read Online Free Page A

young musicians, eventually suggests that another, similar, genre of music would exist in its place, but under another name. It’s a possibility, says the young conductor wearily, half-engrossed in his own thoughts. The girl grabs her satchel and steps down from the stage. As he enters the theater, her father takes a look around to get a sense of the place. He hopes the dreary surroundings, the darkness, the empty seats are only due to the orchestra’s still being in rehearsal, not a foreboding of the concerts ahead. He wanted to be there for the whole rehearsal, but he arrived late. Still, at least he managed to catch the last few notes as he walked in the door. The precocious youngsters are putting away their instruments. The young conductor greets the girl’s father, as does the brilliant composer. Both seem to be on familiar terms with him. They slowly exit the theater together. The girl wonders why her father showed up. He’s never attended a rehearsal before, and she doubts he’d be interested in a work whose chief protagonist is a clown. But she doubts even more that he’d be interested in her. She explains to him part of their repertoire. It’s a new version of an old composition, she says, so fresh it could be mistaken for an original piece, entitled
Dress Rehearsal for Voice and Music Boxes
. He’s not very interested. He happened to be visiting the neighboring country’s capital on business; his presence is a coincidence, that’s all. The screenwriter considers the situation as presented, and asks himself why a father wouldn’t take more of an interest in his own daughter. He doesn’t seem the least bit concerned she might end up in the arms of an unscrupulous roué, he thinks, referring to the young conductor of the orchestra. For some reason, the young conductor’s come to embody the screenwriter’s notion of lubricity and perversion. All fathers must think like this. After all, the world is full of these kinds of people, and although they’re precocious, the young musicians of the orchestra are still kids — dressed in their uniforms, heading for the minibus that will return them to their dorms. We were looking for a place with a foosball table, she says, referring to the conductor, the composer, and herself, who have a puckish streak, unlike the others. In reality, they don’t even know if foosball bars exist here in the neighboring country’s capital. Her father excuses himself, says he must go, for there are people waiting for him elsewhere, and he’s already running late. Let’s suppose twelve-tone music had never been invented, the young conductor is overheard declaiming, no serialism, or any of that stuff. For he wants to know if music with aleatoric elements, or whatever one wishes to call them, could have been conceived at any other time. The brilliant composer doesn’t respond. He seems lost in thought, as if he’s immersed in his mysterious creative process, playing the part of the genius, the brilliant one, the wunderkind that they all imagine him to be. The other two don’t respond either. What do you think? The conductor asks, directing his question at the girl. That it couldn’t have existed at any other time, she says. They walk a few meters in the opposite direction to her father, who’s parked his car a little farther ahead. Night falls, and the screenwriter observes the scene from afar, he sees them poorly lit under a streetlight whose brightness has yet to overtake the dimming twilight. The girl takes a few steps away from her friends and tells her father good-bye. Putting her right arm around him, she feels a revolver at his side and asks him jokingly if he’s on duty, though she’s well aware he’s not a policeman or anything of the sort. He smiles in a routine manner that could be interpreted to mean anything, and she returns to her friends as he makes his way up the street — thinking, perhaps, that the twelve-tone experiment was a failure, and wondering why