A composition for solo piano by Trisha Virdi
Developed through the 2025 Summer Composing Mentorship
Mentored by Soheil Shirangi
Piano:Qin Lan Zhang
Published by Zang Records in September 2026
“Never trust it if it rises fast, it can’t last.”
-Taylor Swift, Labyrinth This piece grew out of the idea of repetition and return; of how things in life, music, and memory often come back, but never in quite the same way. I kept thinking of circles, or perhaps spirals, where motion feels continuous but subtly transformed each time it completes a turn.
The opening has no clear sense of direction. It moves tentatively, feeling its way forward through changing harmonies and textures, curious but uncertain about where it wants to go. Out of this wandering, a lullaby like melody begins to take shape; soft and lyrical, though never entirely stable. The harmony beneath it shifts constantly, so that even when it feels familiar, there’s a quiet unease to it, like a moth circling a light and mistaking it for home. As the piece unfolds, this lullaby returns several times, each repetition altered, in key, register, or contour, as if it is remembering itself differently each time. Rubato passages act like sighs or landing points, giving space for reflection before the music begins to spiral forward again. The sense of time becomes fluid: moments stretch, repeat, and blur, creating the feeling of being caught between memories and dreams.
Eventually, the stillness breaks. The music rises suddenly into a dramatic climax;
loud and unstable. It swells too quickly, almost overwhelming itself, before collapsing just as fast. This moment is not so much a resolution as a release; an inevitable collapseafter rising too far, too soon. When the lullaby returns after this, it carries a new kind of calm. It is quieter, more grounded, as if the earlier turbulence has burned away its uncertainty. The piece ends with a sense of stillness- like a memory fading, or the space just after a dream before you wake.
Trisha Virdi is a composer, orchestrator, music engraver and sound designer working across film, television, theatre, games, and concert music. A pianist since the age of four, she holds a Master’s in Music Composition with Distinction from the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama and a Bachelor’s in Screen Scoring from Berklee College of Music, where she graduated Summa Cum Laude.Her work sits at the intersection of music and storytelling, spanning composition, orchestration, music preparation, production, and sound. Her credits include the Taylor Swift Symphonic Concert, Tokyo Ghoul 10th Anniversary Concert, typesetting James Newton Howard’s Peter Pan score book etc. She has worked with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Macy Schmidt’s Overture Global Entertainment + The Sinfonietta, as well as composers, filmmakers, ensembles, and theatre companies.As a composer, her work spans documentary, animation, film, theatre, and concert music. Her documentary score Clare’s Law received the RTS Journalism Award 2026 and won Best Student Film at WOMEN X, a BAFTA-qualifying festival. Her piano concerto Stolen Lullabies premiered at Atmospheres Festival 2026, where she also led the production of a 50+ person team from the ground up. Her theatre credits include co-composing and sound designing NEW ’25: An Armed Robbery in a Petrol Station off the A38, performed at London’s Young Vic.Alongside her creative practice, Trisha is an educator, researcher, and Women in Games Ambassador. Her research explores authorship, collaboration, representation, and creative agency in music, including her developing concept of Structural Authorship.Whether writing her own music or helping bring another creator’s vision to life, Trisha’s practice is centred on storytelling, collaboration, and turning musical ideas into something that can be heard, performed, and experienced.