Score notes — 2017 · Crime thriller
Midnight Rook
A chess-club crime story scored with ticking percussion, prepared piano and a theme that refuses to resolve until the final move.
Theme sketch — synthesized preview
Hear the unresolved motif
A soft piano sketch of the rook motif, generated in your browser. The film recording adds prepared piano and sub pulses.
C minor · four low steps · 0:09
How it was composed
A clock that never quite ticks straight
The brief was dread, not shock. A 72 BPM pulse runs under nearly every cue, but bars of 7/8 slip in whenever the rook — the film's fixer — enters the frame.
The piano was prepared with felt and coins for a dry, ticking attack, doubled by a sub-bass pulse you feel before you hear. The theme's final note arrives only once: over the last shot.
Main theme — minute by minute
Ticking felt piano
Close-miked hammers count time like a chess clock in an empty hall.
The rook steps down
Four descending minor steps — each one a move closer to the mark.
Sub pulse joins
Low sine swells under the piano; the room itself starts to feel watched.
Resolution, once
The withheld final note lands alone — then silence holds the frame.