Perseids over the Pyrénées
Perseid Night at Yosemite
Perseus is the final piece in Starry Sky Cycle: Northern Sky.
As he reaches the end of this piece, Sisask surely envisions the Perseid meteor shower. NASA has published many magnificent images of the Perseids, but the two that impressed me most are the ones shown above, taken in the Pyrenees National Park and Yosemite Valley.
One summer night, when Sisask was fourteen years old (August 1975), a grand piano had been left outdoors for just one night before being sent away for repairs the following day. As he began to play, the night sky gradually became filled with the immense band of the Milky Way, and above all, the constellation Cassiopeia captivated him. Embraced by the stars, the images in his mind were transformed one after another into music, giving birth to his first constellation piece, Cassiopeia.
At the same time, as he gazed up at the Perseid meteor shower streaming from the Milky Way where Cassiopeia shines, a special dream took shape in his heart—to express all 88 constellations in piano music.
The Perseid meteor shower, one of the highlights of summer, reaches its peak in mid-August, producing between 30 and 100 meteors per hour. These meteors streak swiftly across the sky, often flaring up suddenly and leaving many brilliant fireballs. (The image below was taken above Weikersheim, Germany.)
Perseus is the heroic figure who rescued the beautiful Princess Andromeda, the daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia. The main stream of the Milky Way passes from Cassiopeia through Perseus, and at Perseus’s feet shines the Pleiades star cluster in Taurus.
Perseus is depicted raising a sword in his right hand. As if reflecting the brilliance of that sword, the Double Cluster (NGC 869 and NGC 884) can be seen, as shown in the image above. Nojiri Hōei referred to it as “the hilt of Perseus’s sword” and wrote that, on a moonless night, it appears as a faint glow even to the naked eye. Through binoculars, he described it as resembling a sword adorned with countless jewels, or two handfuls of gold spilled across the sky.
In his left hand, Perseus carries the severed head of the Gorgon Medusa. On Medusa’s forehead shines Algol (Beta Persei), a variable star whose brightness repeatedly changes. The name Algol means “the Demon,” and it is said that people in ancient times feared its eerie, pulsating light.
The red nebula in this image is the California Nebula (NGC 1499), a diffuse nebula located near the southern boundary of Perseus. It was named for its resemblance to the shape of the U.S. state of California. To its right are the Perseus objects IC 348 and NGC 1333, while at the far right is the Pleiades star cluster in the constellation of Taurus.
In the direction of Perseus also lies the dazzling Perseus Cluster of galaxies, about 222 million light-years from Earth. From NASA, I learned a truly astonishing fact about this galaxy cluster.
This image shows the central region of the Perseus Cluster of galaxies. The brightest source at its center is a black hole. Sound waves are generated by the pressure of the hot gas rippling around this black hole, and they propagate through the Perseus Cluster. According to astronomers, the sound is approximately 57 octaves and a major second below middle C—roughly a B-flat—and is considered the lowest note in the universe.
When I learned this, I remembered what Sisask had told me when I first met him in Jäneda, Estonia. He said, “There are sounds in the universe that lie dozens of octaves below the range of human hearing.” At the time, I honestly had no idea what he meant. I felt as though I had finally understood what he had meant.
Sisask’s image of Perseus is “Meditation.”
Although meditation can also be understood as a spiritual practice, I deliberately chose the Japanese word mokusō (黙想), meaning quiet contemplation. By quietly stilling our hearts and listening carefully to the voice—or perhaps the sound—of the universe, we discover that our thoughts begin to deepen.
Sisask’s music for Perseus is centered on the note A, and the piece ends with the lowest A on the piano. Unfortunately, even if he had wished to end the piece on B-flat—the lowest note in the universe—it does not exist on the standard 88-key piano.
But then I noticed something curious! Looking more closely at the score, there is not a single B-flat anywhere in the piece! If this absence was intended to suggest a B-flat beyond the range of human hearing, I find that a fascinating thought.
The piece begins at a tempo of ♩ = 40 with a wavering sonority that evokes the unsettling flicker of the variable star Algol. As its tonal colors change, the vista gradually widens, the tempo accelerates, and an overwhelming energy emerges, as though being drawn into the black hole at the heart of the Perseus Cluster. Reaching the peak marked prestissimo possibile (“as fast as possible”), the music also reaches its maximum dynamic of ffff. Then, as if the rotation itself had suddenly slowed, the tempo drops to ♩ = 32 (I count one measure of 4/4 time in approximately seven seconds), followed by a massive chord containing the piano’s lowest A. From within its resonance, the opening melody returns. An ending without an end... Where does the next world lie? With that lingering question, Starry Sky Cycle – Northern Sky comes to its close.
Next time, we will make one final stop at the Pleiades before concluding this series on Northern Sky.
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