Duration: 7:12
Keys: B minor, F# minor
Subcollection: atmospheric pieces
Story sound clip: opening concussion
Main theme:
This piece was one of two that I recorded during the first summer of working on the project (2004). The other was "No Particular Night or Morning," which I consider the partner piece to "Kaleidoscope" (they both are the second track on their respective discs and they are the only two stories that take place entirely in space). I recorded them together so that I could easily utilize the same bank of space sounds and effects to create similar soundscapes for the two pieces. I recorded them first because I knew they would be more atmospheric in nature rather than "songy" and those are always easier to record, so I wanted to use them to get my feet wet into the project (rather than starting with one of the really important pieces like "The Veldt" or "The Rocket").
Story
The piece begins just like the story, with a concussion that sends four men sailing into space. Just after the explosion you will hear an F# begin and be held and held and held. This is actually four F#'s sounding simultaneously in the center -- one for each of the men in the story. Throughout the first section of music these four F#'s begin to drift away from each other, moving from all pan center to one hard left, one mid-left, one mid-right, and one hard right. After the guitar section concludes they drift even farther apart as two descend and two ascend in pitch. This of course represents the four characters in the story who are drifting away from each other in space. Eventually the four sound particles in "Kaleidoscope" arrive at a wide F#-minor chord which provides the backdrop for the space effects. In a similar way, the entire piece should feel as though it spreads out as it goes along.
Music
Going back to the guitar section, it was conceived fairly simply. I used the key of two of my favorite acoustic guitar songs ("Televators" by The Mars Volta and "I Could Have Lied" by Red Hot Chili Peppers) and my favorite time signature - 6/8. Then, after finding a few of my own style chords (e.g., the A2+6 and the G+6 with double strings at 1:29) I could put it all together. With regard to phrasing, I wanted this opening section to be very polyphonic to represent the continuous drifting in the story. This sense of motion comes through constantly in Bradbury's writing and I wanted to capture a similar feeling in the music. So I crafted the chord progression so that the Bm chords are simultaneously the end of the previous phrase and the beginning of the next phrase, and the melody is also intended to soar in a way that it is usually impossible to separate phrases.
Many of the guitar sounds that I used throughout The Illustrate Man came prepackaged on my Digitech effects pedal. For "Kaleidoscope", however, I spent quite a bit of time creating the particular guitar sound used for the swelling melody over the first few minutes of the piece. Coincidentally, there is a nearly identical guitar sound on John Frusciante's The Will to Death album ("Wishing"). I would like to state, though, that I finished recording "Kaleidoscope" on July 13, 2004 and did not listen to Frusciante's The Will to Death until early 2005. I cannot prove this, and in fact Frusciante's album was released in June of 2004, but my statement is nonetheless true. (Read about a similar occurrence with "The Other Foot".)
The way that I recorded the space soundscape section is as follows: once I have a suitable backdrop in place (i.e., the F# chord and some white noise) then I pick a sound from the list that I've generated for this particular piece (apropos, this list is very similar to the list for "No Particular Night or Morning"), hit record at the beginning of the section, and make stuff up as I go along based on the chords and the key. In "Kaleidoscope" I made passes with about five different sounds and in the end am just as excited to hear how it all came together as I hope my listeners are. There are always moments that are exciting for me (like the entrance of the space pulse and its interaction with the other parts at 4:59) because they were unplanned and just naturally occurred.
The final seconds of the piece were, of course, designed to represent the shooting star which is central to the conclusion of the story.
Tidbits
listen to the strumming guitar slowly morph and then drift away from 2:00 to 3:35.
The soft static that can be heard throughout the piece was recorded from my clock-radio which was given to me by Violet Hanna (aka, Grandma Violet) and has been with me every morning since 7th grade.
Composer Trademarks
(chordal soundscape) 3:30 to the end
My Favorite Moments
The guitar entrance at 1:34.
The soaring high notes at 1:53.
The guitar bend at 2:19.
The pulse at 5:48.