Down The Hole

Composed for a Composer Club challenge from the prompt "Alice goes down the rabbit hole." I took the approach that I thought Lewis Carroll would -- absurdist commentary on contemporary society. I think you'll find all of this very thinly veiled. Story with timecodes that correspond to the music below. -- Down the [Rabbit] Hole [0:00] I was contemplating a nap on a Saturday afternoon, when a rabbit caught my eye. It was wearing a hat and and had a camera. [0:15] Every few hops it would take a picture and say, "What a story!" I decided to follow. [0:43] A tunnel?! I looked inside: It was dank and there was a strange light emanating from below. [1:06] I was thinking to turn back, when it was as if the world rotated so that forward was now down, and I was falling falling, through roots and moss, then a subway system, then pipes and wires. Some of the wires let off puffs of steam. [1:43] One of the puffs softened my landing onto the ground. I found myself in a field, which looked like it was either for battle or sports, or both. [1:53] There were two teams, one red and one blue. The game was throwing tiny birds at one another. The two sides mirrored each other's movements, volley for volley. I saw banners on the field that showed the blue team was playing for the Old White Woman of the Woods, and the red team was fighting for Father Toad. They got farther apart as they went, so I ran through the middle. [2:35] I ran in the direction that I thought the rabbit had gone. [2:42] I soon found myself on a hot, sunny beach. The sun was so hot and bright I could barely see. [3:05] As I squinted, I saw the sand covered in crabs, clattering their claws as they went back and forth into the ocean. They were gathering pearls, fighting each other to see who could make the biggest tower and then sit atop it. The biggest crabs pushed the smaller crabs off of their towers and the pearls spilled all around. [3:24] Then the toads came, flanked by rabbits with trumpets to herald their approach. They were giant warty hopping toads, and they jingled as they hopped, as if they had swallowed many coins. [3:51] Immediately they began slurping up the crabs and their pearl towers, and spitting out the shells. I feared for my life, but they ignored me. [4:03] At once they all stopped, and stood as if at attention. The largest, ugliest, most repulsive toad I'd ever seen came glumping onto the scene. He was as large and as warty as any three of the other toads, who burped up coins and pearls in front of him as he passed by. Everyone waited eagerly for him to speak. [4:10] He hesitated, and then let out a powerful belching croak. Out gushed a river of swampy water and pearls and crab shells, washing everything (including me) away from the beach. [4:15] We were washed back onto the field of combat, and as the water dissipated, I saw that Father Toad was being coronated King. The red team sang "All hail King Toad!" while the blue team cried. There were thousands of rabbits rejoicing and taking pictures and saying "What a story!". It was a Fool's Ball! Everyone was dancing and swirling and twirling and belching and croaking and throwing birds and chittering and clacking faster and faster and faster -- and oh! By now you've probably figured out that I took that nap after all.