12. Strings from “The Unanswered Question” tied with the strings from “How to Disappear Completely”
More in the theme of unanswered pleas. Both of these compositions are beautifully bleak. This first piece, written in 1908 by genius American composer Charles Ives, fills me with quiet dread. I was fortunate enough to hear it performed live at Carnegie Hall, and that’s when I realized that it was the epic, ominous wash of strings behind everything else that was raising my nape-hairs. Hugely influential on my own music. I have no idea if the guys from Radiohead were inspired by Ives when they wrote their own swirling, swelling paean to uncertainty on Kid A nearly century later, but that song knocks me on my ass, too. Again, it’s the string bed that gets to me.
