Variations on Emotion No. 2 - Love - "Was it Meant to Be?"
About two years ago now, I wrote a suite of 11 pieces called Variations on Emotion. As the title might suggest, all of the pieces are about a separate emotion that I had chosen to represent musically. Each piece is labeled with the emotion attached to it, and each title was inspired by the emotion. It was a purely emotional experience and I attached stories to most of them afterward, as represented by the title. This is the second of eleven, being Love.
"Love is possibly one of the most difficult emotions to quantify or explain. "Words alone cannot" describe love. Music though, does seem to have the power to convey love. I'm not exactly sure what it is about music that is able to do this, but it's so magical and so amazing; it can make you smile and it can make you cry. So, what better emotion to turn to next than to love? This was the last piece in which I would use a different format than the rest. I again opted for solo instruments. I chose the piano and the cello. I only wanted two this time because love is shared between two people, or at least, the most intimate love is. It's not exactly "happy" sounding as one may expect it to sound. I took a page out of the book of John Williams and James Horner. Sometimes, when they compose their "love themes", they compose them in a minor key. In my case, this was only partially true. I shifted between minor and major. I began in minor and ended in major. I thought this would give the sense of the travails of love. While love can be joyous, at the same time it can be emotionally tumultuous. There are times within the piece where the cello and piano are sounding simultaneously, but not with the same notes, so it gives the impression of two people in love. Again, this music is more ambient rather than melodic, but it does have many melodic elements to it. The opening melody that piano has is shifted to the cello as a variation later in the piece representing that kind of lover's intuition. The title of the piece came from the melancholy sounding nature of the piece itself. It reminded me of a tumultuous relationship that had its ups and downs. Was it Meant to Be simply refers to the confusion and flux of other emotions that one has when in love. It's not your traditional type of love music. I wanted to do something different, and something original. I believe I've accomplished that and I hope the listener understand what I was trying to convey." - Travis Grubissi
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