Caves hold a special place in the human psyche, a place of fear, fascination, and superstition. The knowledge that even the ground beneath our feet holds all the mystery of an alien planet is terrifying yet exhilarating. Over the millennia, human beings have reacted to this knowledge in many ways, and this piece illustrates three of those.

1: Fear

There is the fear we avoid and the fear we seek, and caves promise us both. This movement leans into the thrill of facing the unknown, the simultaneous sensations of excitement and terror.

2: Ritual

One way that humans make sense of what we fear is by creating meaning through ritual, taking many forms across culture, geography, and time. This movement imagines a ritual held in a cave, torchlight dancing over cave paintings. The instruments act as participants, each presenting a melody in turn and allowing the others to add their heterophonic embellishments. Mimicking the common ritual framework from modern Pagan traditions, the movement is largely symmetrical, the opening and closing sections taking the place of the invocation and devocation respectively. Between these, we hear the participants achieve a unitary state and experience the divinity of Earth within the cave.

3: Science

Another way that humans seek to make sense of things that frighten us is to study them scientifically. This movement begins with the coalescence of dripping water sounds into a waltz and progresses to a repetition and elaboration of the material from the middle of movement two. Though the paths are different, the destination is the same. Scientific understanding does not dull the mystery, but instead enhances it, bringing the wonder glimpsed through ritual into a different but related light.