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Imagine yourself in a maze of forgotten corridors, dancing through a time that never truly began. Everything repeats... The lights flicker the same way, the walls hum the same pitch... And yet, everything feels just slightly off. Change without meaning. At first, the absence of dead ends felt like freedom, but now it’s maddening. You long for a conclusion, a destination but every turn leads you further into uncertainty. You’ve been walking for a while now, though you're no longer sure what “a while” means. Time here is unmeasured, and so are you.
This contemporary solo piano piece tries to assemble different colours of liminality, creating both heavy and light ambiences. The musical ideas which vastly differ in each repeat create an unsettling and thick progression which gives its pronoun; gray. It tries to stay within the boundaries of atonality.
The idea of liminality [being between worlds, never fully present] became a mirror for my state of mind. Writing Gray Liminality was my way of giving shape to that emptiness. It was a small act of hope, a way to rebuild some structure from the ruins of routine.
Gray for the emotional fog-like state. Sometimes peaceful, sometimes frightening, but always a little uncertain. And Liminality for that strange, undefined space where reality seems to dissolve.
I have known liminal aesthetic long before the creation of the first liminal piece. It was an interesting and new concept worth to explore.
It was a rough semester. A period of confusion, unorganized opportunities, rapid environmental changes. Throughout my first year of university, everything I thought I have known was degrading, then period of the gray came.
My 1st grade started in 2023 fall, I had moved to the dorms, which I could not spend any time rather then sleeping because of my roommates. I was wondering throughout the old buildings of the university. Somedays I was in an old lab, sometimes in the alley of the classrooms. Sometimes I was in somewhere I wasn’t supposed to be, and sometimes I was in the grassy place, watching stars. Everyday was little different, and it was hard to keep up with a consistent lifestyle.
After entering to the student Radio of my university, I started spend most of my time there. It wasn’t closing unless there were people, which translates that I was even sleeping there. The thing is, that place was an old, dusty, and a weird place, which kept the air of 80s. Because radio is on a downfall contrasting to other media mediums, it is glued together by no money, no necessity, no authority, but the will and enthusiasm of the students. I love Radio Bilkent, but it is one of the most liminal spaces you can find right now. In-between the past glory and future unpredictability, it stands a bit faded, but still there.
After entering to the student Radio of my university, I started spend most of my time there. It wasn't closing unless there were people, which translates that I was even sleeping there. The thing is, that place was an old, dusty, and a weird place, which kept the air of 80s. Because radio is on a downfall contrasting to other media mediums, it is glued together by no money, no necessity, no authority, but the will and enthusiasm of the students. I love Radio Bilkent, but it is one of the most liminal spaces you can find right now. In-between the past glory and future unpredictability, it stands a bit faded, but still there.
And through the days and nights under a heavy bombardment full of work and duties from school, with the complex emotions for a career based on uncertainty but determinism, I composed the gray liminality. It is as chaotic as my life during that period of time, a mirror into my degrading mental health. This piece made me realise how close I was walking to sea, almost fully submerged by it. And while I am looking back, this was just the start of this watery adventure.
If I could change anything, probably I would try to be more apathic, because no amount of success is worth to drown for such a long time… However, I still give value to this album, not because of its origin, but the pure ambiguity of creating something unique, and self reflective. I usually tend to hide my personality under the deepest oceans, highest mountains, because I don't like it to look at its distorted image, outside my idealist mind. But I also find this behaviour problematic. So, this is a good way to start, and you will see how my academic pieces reflects myself more than any pieces I have created so far…
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