Catatonic Variations

CATATONIC VARIATIONS

The Music Emporium album opens with “Nam Myo Renge Kyo” that features chants of the Buddhist mantra that forms the title, along with psychedelic-style lyrics in the manner of the Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. “Catatonic Variations” features an atonal structure that was just coming into vogue in the classical world, if I am remembering that correctly. The album closes with the obligatory protest song, “Day of Wrath” that features the tag lyric: “There is no question that there will be peace on earth / But will man be here to enjoy it”.

(October 2013)