Nightmare

Opening his eyes, young Rachie found himself – not on his bed – but lying down on something soft. Getting up, he saw that he was lying on a bed of almost darkened grass. Looking around his surroundings, he saw that he was in a graveyard. Though he was eighteen years old, and not afraid of anything, yet the immediate surroundings made him tremble like a child.

In the foggy atmosphere, he reckoned out that he was in one of those old Muscovite graveyards. Flurries were flying around him like small white phantoms……a cold wind had also started blowing gently. Then, in the distance, Rachie heard a voice – a dim, gloomy voice of a man, reading the Holy Scripture – or so he thought by the words spoken by that man.

A funeral probably, thought Rachie, as he advanced in the direction where the voice was coming from. The fog was increasing, making the visibility almost impossible. Rachie walked carefully through the graves – the stones looked like some broken down artifact of the past – and reached the voice. He saw that there was a priest standing nearby, dressed in black, muttering verses from the Bible in a solemn manner.

Rachie felt uneasy. Unlike other funerals, where the family and friends of the deceased gathered and silently stand over there, watching with tearful eyes as the dead departed. However, in this case, there was only the priest and a solitary mourner, who was five to six graves away, mourning his beloved. Rachie saw a coffin, just a few feet away from him. Maybe in there lay the person, whose last rites were now being performed…..

‘Ahem, pardon me, can you tell me exactly whose funeral is it?’ Rachie asked the priest, but no – the priest just went on with his business, paying no attention to the newly arrived stranger.

Rachie stared around. Where was he?

He then walked up to the mourner; he hoped of getting to know his surroundings (he was still quite unsure, though he had truly come to an old graveyard) but there also, he could not obtain an answer. The mourner stood as he was, motionless – his eyes fixed upon the grave. Rachie was wondering what to do, when suddenly…

Rachie heard it. Another voice was coming from somewhere. However, this time it was not from the priest’s side, that voice came from…

Rachie gulped down. The voice came from the coffin!

The voice was grim and gloomy, and as if – Rachie heard – it was solemnly calling out his name, in pieces:

‘Sergey……Serge….Rach…..Rachie….’

Those four words continued to hover about Rachie. He had a strong belief now that the voice was coming from the coffin – or was it? Somehow, Rachie felt a strong desire to go and find out to who owned the voice. He wanted to see whose funeral it was. The coffin – yes – the coffin had to be opened. The answer lay over there, waiting…

The fog was now growing more thickly. Rachie saw that the coffin was some meters away. He began to walk fast towards it. It looked as if he had been hypnotized by some invisible magic, and he was working accordingly to its commands. He now started sprinting towards it. A sense of dread was slowly surrounding him. He moved faster….even faster….towards the wooden box. At last, he reached it. Rachie stopped. He was sweating even in this cold.

Taking a deep breath, and after reasoning with himself, Rachie lifted the lid.

He gasped, and nearly was about to faint.

The lifeless eyes of an eighteen-year-old boy stared straight into him - the only difference was that it wasn’t just any ordinary boy, but a boy Rachie knew pretty well…

The coffin contained the body of none other than himself - that is – Rachie!

Rachie tried to breathe. The previous seconds had made him almost speechless. This can’t happen, he thought aloud. It can’t be so! But…

Rachie suddenly felt that the cold was getting all around him. The fog was now getting more and more denser. He tried to move, but he couldn’t. His legs felt like sticks of lead. He just took one step, and fell down to the soft ground. Darkness began to gather around him. With ever-decreasing eyesight, he saw that the coffin was slowly moving away into the dense fog....and he heard the bell toll. The famous Bells of Moscow. He heard another voice – the same dreadful voice which was calling him……his eyes began to close….

‘Ser….gei……Rachie…Rach…….

***

Sergei jolted up from his bed. The first rays of cold sunlight penetrated the curtains and fell into his room. It was seven o’clock, the 27th of August, 1892.

He got up from his bed, stretched a little bit, and then sat down at his study-table, wondering about the nightmare he had last night. Had he truly been there, in that bleak and dark cold, or was it only just a dreadful dream? Though he tried his best to think to of a logical explanation, he couldn’t just find one. Perhaps, after dark, such strange things do play their cadences…..

Sergei looked at his table. He was working on a set of five preludes, dedicated to his harmony teacher, Anton Arensky, back at the Conservatory. The first one was an elegy, and he was pondering over what he could use for his second prelude…

A flash of light suddenly went past by him. That’s it! The horrifying dream which he saw can be expressed by him musically, in the form of his second prelude!

So, immediately after breakfast, Sergei – after cleaning up his room – sat down at his table. Setting the key to C# Minor, he began composing. Little did he knew, that this piece would turn out to be his most terrifying piece ever….and soon, he himself would begin to hate it…

***

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1 April 1873 – 28 March 1943) was a late-Romantic Russian composer. His pieces are notable for their melodicism, expressiveness, and rich orchestral colors.

‘Prelude in C# Minor, Op.3 No.2’ was written by Rachmaninoff when he was only eighteen years old. It was the second of a set of five preludes, ‘Morceaux de fantaisie’ which he composed by him in 1892. The piece is notable for its macabre tone, thanks to its hard chords. 

The story which I have told above is actually the base on which he composed this chilling prelude. However, Rachmaninoff personally hated this piece. Every time, wherever he used to play as a pianist, the common request which he would get was to play the prelude, which made him literally tired by playing it, concert after concert. Also, at the time this piece was published, he did not get any royalties for it. Still, ‘Prelude in C# Minor’ continues to be as one of the most terrifying pieces of music repertoire.

The link given below is a recording of the composer playing this prelude, way back in 1919. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcG-DnGdWRw

M.Macabre

20.07.2020

Imagecourtesy: Google Images