I was introduced to David Sylvian's sublime 1987 album Secrets of the Beehive by an older cousin with cooler musical taste, and the music -- this song in particular -- has stayed with me ever since. "Orpheus" almost makes me wish I had synesthesia, so I could experience it as a canvas of shimmering color, or subtle gradations of flavor. And for me the song comes trailing ghosts: of a time in my life filled with homesickness and loneliness, but also of promise and discovery -- a net of tangled memory and emotion, much of which I'm sure I still need to process. Maybe that's appropriate for such an impressionistic, evocative song.
I love so much about this: The drums keeping time in a gentle, rolling waltz. The strings and horns floating in and out, like a half-remembered dream. Guest musician and famed composer Ryuichi Sakamoto gracing the track with exquisite piano accents. The way the song pauses on a sustained, fading chord for a long while -- as if considering an ending, while you can briefly catch a hint of children's laughter in the distance, like the ghost of a playground -- then resumes, as a wistful horn solo drifts in. And the poetry of the lyrics, delivered in Sylvian's coolly elegant baritone, striking the balance between melancholy and joyful hope:
I wrestle with an outlook on life That shifts between darkness and shadowy light... Sunlight falls, my wings open wide There's a beauty here I cannot deny... I will hear the promise of my Orpheus sing. Does Sylvian sing as himself, holding up the mythical poet-singer as muse to his art? Does he sing as the shade of Eurydice, hoping to be saved by her husband, the final suspended chord a reminder of his failure? The song leaves space for many answers. Here's one more: maybe we're all Orpheus and Eurydice, still seeking daylight, leading each other through a valley of shadows -- our ending still unwritten, as we choose daily to hold fast or lose faith. Let's hold fast today.
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