Hand in Hand at the Edge of the Sky

PROGRAM NOTE

I first visited the Mount Wilson Observatory in July of 2013. The trip left a considerable impression, and for nearly a year afterward I had the nagging feeling that I needed to write a work based on my trip there, inspired by its history, the natural beauty of the area and its surroundings, related universal themes, and my own personal experiences at the time.

Mount Wilson is perched nearly a mile above Los Angeles. It is prominent from many locales, especially in the Pasadena area. I could see it from my doorstep, from places where I worked, from seemingly everywhere I went. After finally making the trip, the place’s omnipresence fed my drive to compose a work commemorating it.

I took the tour offered by a scientist who worked at the observatory. Although the tour ran a bit longer than advertised, his passion for the place and the history he related were riveting and inspiring. Prior to this experience, I had little knowledge of the historical significance of this locale, and was amazed how long it had gone unnoticed, looming soundlessly above my backyard. It was a romantic thought, imagining explorers like George Ellery Hale, Edwin Powell Hubble, and so many others at this constantly progressing frontier of discovery. I imagined the telescope’s giant steel gears turning slowly and precisely as a scientist kept a particular star in his crosshairs, perhaps another making calculations with slide rules and chalk and pencil, with the patience and dedication of monks illuminating manuscripts.

The natural beauty of this place was equally stirring. At the top of the mountain, the city lies flat before you, as if viewed from a plane. The summit seems to hover, as if the earth itself were stretching out toward an unreachable sky, just as our curious species has always striven toward transcendence, from our earliest migrations, to waves of brave seafarers, to the Voyager spacecraft, and beyond.

Writing this piece was also very personal for me. That day on the mountain was also one of the last I spent with a woman I loved immeasurably, at a time when I felt our relationship was slipping away, yet when I also clung to hope that it would survive somehow. You will hear my heart as her hand took mine, the vistas we shared together, the soft rain that fell as we walked quietly through the trees, and even her own name, written forever in the stars.

I think of this piece as a visual tone poem of my trip, and influenced by more universal themes. In both senses, it is a journey from the terrestrial to the astral, and beyond. It starts with the slam of two car doors, and continues excitedly as the engine chugs up the winding mountain roads. I thought of the hum and metallic lattices of the small forest of radio antennas atop the mountain. I tried to create a musical description of the form of pine trees, from trunk to needle, each patterned similarly, yet realized in unique ways. I pondered a radiant column of sunlight, split into its elements, and the sun itself, splitting and sparking atoms, terrifyingly immense and silent. I recalled how I felt the warmth of my lover’s hand in mine. I imagined a century’s worth of stargazing in this place, timelapsed telescopes spinning under their domes, thousands of night skies revolving, the sound of optimism and discovery. Then it subsides into a beautiful soft rain that fell on the dry earth as I departed with my beloved through the pines. And then, instead of getting in the car, we continue to travel upward, into the sky. Venus appears first. Her name is written in the stars as they appear. A trickle at first, but soon, a rush of countless millions. Finally, I imagined the stars being subsumed by dark matter and energy, vibrating pulsars, the coldness of space—the unknown frontiers that lie before each of us.