Program notes for a universe formed during intermission – Performance night one.
Observed shortly before intermission. Note the presence of the creator’s feet for scale, accountability, and mild judgment.
At first glance, skeptics will say the image above is just a spill.
Condensation. Gravity doing what gravity does. A little gross, maybe inconvenient, but ultimately meaningless.
That theory collapses under even casual scrutiny.
What you are actually looking at is creation mid-process.
These universes did not form randomly.
They were conducted.
Movement I: Knell
The first influence was Knell, a piece that does not ask permission. It tolls. It announces. It tells time itself to sit up straight.
In the forming universes, this became gravity.
Weight entered existence early. Time gained consequence. Civilizations learned—almost immediately—that actions echo. Bells rang. Empires understood mortality not as tragedy, but as fact. No one was surprised by endings. Only mildly irritated by them.
A very efficient start.
Movement II: Brahms — Violin Concerto, Op. 77
Then Brahms arrived, and everything got complicated.
Lyricism entered the equation. Chaos learned restraint. Beauty became something worth pursuing even when it refused to be easy.
In several of the larger puddle-galaxies, entire species evolved around long melodic lines and unresolved tension. Leaders emerged who were brilliant, stubborn, and exhausting. Some universes developed the concept of longing before they developed fire.
Brahms does that.
Movement III: Sibelius — Symphony No. 2
And then came Sibelius.
This is where the universes decided to survive.
Themes surged. Structures rose from silence. Cold places learned hope. Mountains formed. Revolutions happened. Someone, somewhere, stood on a metaphorical cliff in a strong wind and realized endurance was not accidental, it was earned.
Historians in multiple dimensions would later agree: the final movement was the turning point.
On the Presence of the Feet
The shoes remain in the frame for a reason.
Not ego. Not aesthetics. Context.
Creation was not abstract. It happened between movements. Between breaths. Between counting rests and watching a conductor’s left hand. The creator did not descend in thunder, he stood in black concert shoes on a rubber floor, aware that someone would step in it if he didn’t.
And when the concert ended, the universes continued on, unaware that their physics had been shaped by bells, a violin line that refused to behave, and a Finnish symphony that absolutely meant something whether anyone was ready or not.
Eventually, yes, the floor was cleaned.
But the music had already happened.
And that, unfortunately for the skeptics, cannot be mopped up. I wonder what Friday’s concert will produce?
© 2026, Robert Owen. All rights reserved.
