The Fourth Factor

I’m in a library, doing research for a school assignment. While I’m still not sure what materials I’ll need for it, I figure it would be a good idea to get some likely books since I happen to be here anyway. The assignment seems to involve music, specifically the composer Borodin, so I return to a shelf on the floor directly above the ground one where I had been earlier in the dream. About all I can remember of that earlier part was listening to a song with a couple other people, including my aunt. It had a heartbreakingly beautiful ending, but when I asked my aunt for a translation from the Russian, the text turned out to be a rather banal folk song about two mice.

Anyway, once I get there, I pull a book from the shelf and flip it open to an analysis – probably a violin part, in either D or E. A very simplified reduction shows the staff with the I note, the IV and V above it a little later on, and then the ii on the octave below. The text explains how the melody avoids these structurally important notes (IV and V) and instead goes in a series of dark, ambiguous spirals that land on the ii each time.

27.10.21