George Winston - Minstrels
White.
Silence.
A single piano note sounds, plucked, rather than struck. With it, a thin black vertical line appears on the screen. Another plucked note accompanies the appearance of another black line. Six times notes are plucked, six thin, evenly spaced vertical black lines cross the screen like bars of a cell.
A haunting, mournful, fragile piano line begins off in the distance. The thin black lines recede, more being added to the sides. A hand flutters by and we realize that the black lines are spaces between piano keys. The camera continues to lift straight up until we see a man in white, head bowed, playing the delicate tune. He is in a white room, shadows of light coming through a barred door spill across the floor. The piano line repeats, a little stronger this time.
The shadows of the door blow open and a white chiffon scarf floats into the frame, draping itself around the pianist, who stops playing and looks in the direction from which it came. The piano music continues.
The pianist gets up, holding the scarf, and the camera tilts to follow him through the door and out into an impossibly sunny day, with iridescent green grass under a breathtakingly blue sky. A woman in a white dress runs, giggling, up a small knoll to a tree with a swing. The pianist runs after her, laughing.
The camera follows them up the hill. The piano line repeats, this time accompanied by a string line playing simple harmony. She sits on the swing, coyly waiting for him. He reaches her and pushes, the swing soars up, her white dress billowing in the wind. She laughs, he laughs.
The piano line begins again, and this time the string line plays a different harmony, something softer and darker and full of gentle doubt. He stops her swing. They peer breathlessly into each other’s eyes. They kiss. The camera continues to push in to her face until it fills the frame, full of simple satisfaction and peace. Her movement slows down until it stops completely. The string line fades away. The piano line begins again, fragile, like the beginning, receding off to the side. The color drains from her face until the image is black and white. The camera pulls back and reveals her picture, torn from a magazine, stuck to a plain white wall, one tattered corner flapping in the gentle wind.
The piano continues its faltering melody.
The camera pulls away from the picture on the wall and tilts down, revealing dark lines across the white floor. The lines are shadows cast by bars across a window. The piano line, continuing inexorably, fades out to a bare whisper. The camera continues to pull out, revealing a man – the pianist – sitting in the lined shadows against the wall, arms tied tightly around his chest to prevent him from hurting himself. He rocks slowly, softly, his eyes closed, his head bowed. The camera pulls up, revealing the entire room. Four white walls. No door. A tattered picture of an anonymous model torn from a magazine and taped to one of the walls. Strong parallel shadows spilling from the barred window across the floor. And in the corner, forever hugging himself, the pianist rocks. The music has faded away entirely.
Silence.
White.