Symphony in Grey

The Symphony in Grey is a musical holding of the Grey classification, catalogued on Floor 158 (the Aural Greyreading Room) and most frequently cited as the Tower's foremost example of an "Arrested Development" work — a composition whose final movement exists only as marginalia. It is not to be confused with The Unfinished Symphony in G-Chromatic Minor, which is incomplete by loss, nor with The Hesitant Symphony, which is incomplete by design. The Symphony in Grey is incomplete by annotation: its fourth movement was never entered on the staves, and survives solely as remarks written in the margins by the copyist, who appears to have believed he was taking instructions rather than composing.

Physical description

The holding comprises 212 folios of greywove paper in a binding of laminated slate-board, stamped at the spine with the catalogue mark 158-G/4. The first three movements are fully scored for an ensemble of eleven strings, two muted horns, and a struck instrument designated only as "the plate." The fourth movement occupies no staves at all. Its pages carry the ruled staff, the bar lines, the rehearsal letters A through Q, and nothing between them but margin notes in a cramped hand, of which the most frequently quoted reads: "hold here until the room agrees."

The paper is of the same stock as that used for the Grey Ledgers of Sub-level 7-Ξ, though the watermark differs by one tooth of the mould. Conservators at the Aural Greyreading Room regard the folios as stable; the ink, a dull grey designated Indelible Grey, has not faded in the recorded period and is not expected to.

The marginalia question

Whether the margin notes constitute the fourth movement or merely comment upon its absence has been the subject of a dispute running, in one form or another, since the holding's accession. The Interim Committee for Resonance Management has reviewed the status of the fourth movement on eleven occasions and has each time deferred, citing the difficulty of determining authorial intent in a hand that also annotated the grocery accounts of the copyist's household on folios 199 and 201.

"Where a movement is indicated by rehearsal letters, bar lines, and a stated tempo, the absence of notes is a matter of notation and not of existence."

— Fourth Concordance on Holdings and Their Limits, Annex 9

The opposing position rests on the Ninth Concordance, which holds that a movement is constituted by its sounding and that "that which is not scored is not held, but only promised." The two annexes have never been reconciled. A note in the accession file, signed by the then-Keeper of the Aural Greyreading Room, observes only that "both readings have been applied to the same performance, on different evenings, without audible difference."

Performance history and the Grey Convocation

The Symphony in Grey was performed in full — the term is used advisedly — at the Grey Convocation of the winter of the year recorded as 3,114, before an audience of Delegates instructed to remain silent throughout the fourth movement. The instruction was intended to allow the ensemble to hold the rests indefinitely, in accordance with the copyist's note. The Delegates held for forty-one minutes, at which point a Delegate from the eastern galleries was heard to clear his throat, and the ensemble, treating this as the room's agreement, closed the movement and the work.

The incident produced the Ruling of the Cleared Throat, which established that audience noise during a held rest is to be construed as a terminal signal unless the programme states otherwise. The ruling has since been applied to four other holdings, twice incorrectly. Programme notes for the Symphony in Grey now carry the line "the room is not expected to agree," which visiting Delegates frequently mistake for a general remark on the acoustics.

Relationship to Receding Grey

Because the holding is classified under the Standard Grey practice, it is liable to Receding Grey, and has receded twice: once in the year 2,908, when the third movement lost fourteen bars from its closing pages, and once in the spring of the following accession, when the rehearsal letters on folio 187 shifted from Q to P. The Grey Niche was convened on the first occasion and declined to intervene, on the grounds that the movement had been "reduced toward its own character." The Grey Niche debates record a dissent by the junior member, who argued that a work about incompleteness ought not to be permitted to complete its own erasure. The dissent is preserved and has never been adopted.

Inventory of the fourth movement

The following is the accepted inventory of the fourth movement's surviving contents, as drawn up by the Aural Greyreading Room in the year 3,102 and revised once since:

• Seventeen rehearsal letters, A through Q, of which Q is considered doubtful.
• Six tempo indications, five of them the word lento and the sixth a direction to consult the copyist's brother.
• Two dynamic markings, both p, one of them struck through.
• One margin note reading "the plate is not to be struck here," followed by a second note reading "strike the plate."

The two notes on the plate have never been resolved, and the ensemble's practice is to follow the second. A standing instruction of the Aural Greyreading Room prohibits the playing of the fourth movement before the third, a rule introduced after a recital in the year 3,061 in which the work was heard backwards and several Delegates reported finding it improved.