The story begins in the 1990s on a hushed note, with the narrator, Kathy Carey Mulligann), who calls herself a "carer," reminiscing about her childhood while watching a man, Tommy Andrew Garfieldd), as he's readied for an operation.
He seemed to realize how good the Liszt songs had been and gained a burst of energy from them, returning to sing Tchaikovsky's "Six Romances" (the last works the composer completed) with rhapsodic assurance, dramatically underplaying the crushing refrain of "We Sat Together" and building inexorably through the final song, "Again, as Before, Alone," then ending on a soberly hushed note.
The note of pity, the hushed tone of concern, the carefully sculpted facial expressions of anguish — I became so sick of these that, in response to strangers' questions about the contours of my family or the number of my siblings, I stopped mentioning my brother at all.
He aborted the first ascent, changing the melody to avoid even going there, and struggled to control the hushed high notes of the glorious ending.
But the bartender continues, in a hushed tone.
Many critics noted the similarities between the episode and the David Lynch television series Twin Peaks, with one reviewer writing there was a "definite Peaks-y vibe to tonight's episode, from the setting Noyo County, Washington, home of a diner with "famous pies"—to the off-kilter camera angles and hushed tone".
Phrase by phrase, they change texture and dynamics: a hushed trumpet note, tendrils of delicate acoustic picking, a flurry of solo saxophone, a blast of electric guitar.
They spoke in hushed tones, noting both the talent that remains for next season and the difficulty teams have in returning to title games, talented or not.
Guests sat around the hushed booths, scribbling notes to each other on index cards, like Luddites in an Internet chat room.
Leaning just slightly into the second note of their triplet before Kundry's hushed opening line in the third act, the cellos subtly heightened the impact of her suffering.
