Contrapuntal

In honor of Bach's birthday, a meditation on counterpoint, on two voices (or three, or four!) that sing alone — and together.

Two independent melodies, touching so lightly and so infrequently that they seem to be strangers — meandering up and down the scale alone, breaking into random song, complete enough to threaten each other, yet never doing so. Seemingly independent.

But they know each other, oh yes they do. And though they have their own motives and pace, when the end comes and they have made their own way through the measures, they pause, settle down happily and embrace.