My Cousin Rachel is a film based on the 1951 novel by Daphne Du Maurier, the music by Rael Jones. The Gothic romance concerns a young Englishman who, convinced that his attractive and mysterious cousin has murdered his guardian, plots revenge. But as he, Ambrose Ashley, becomes enamored of the widowed Contessa (Rachel) Sangalletti, his resolve weakens as he falls in love. His suspicions remain, however, especially since his late guardian felt Cousin Rachel was poisoning hm with seeds from a laburnum tree. Because he failed to tell Rachel of the dangers in the construction of a bridge over a sunken garden being built on the Ambrose estate, she inadvertently plummets through and dies, even as Ambrose had failed to find anything incriminating in her room to confirm his lethal doubts.

1. Who’s To Blame features a piano introduction and low string melody. The eerie melody line and harmony establishes the dark, uneasy mood that defines the novel’s mental atmosphere.
2. Memory of a Happy Day begins ominously but opens up into a romance for piano and strings.
3. Headaches Blind Me. The music suggests the later passion.
4. By the Throat is a sinister mood piece. It ends abruptly, unresolved.
5. Clean Up continues the mood of romantic anxiety with dark chords and high pedal that ends with a brief piano coda.
6. Happy Day is a pastoral idyll.
7. Christmas. Woodwinds and plucked low strings add to the occasion’s romantic glamor.
8. Tisane is a very brief character sketch.
9. Signing marks the transfer of the estate to Rachel and casts a dire, threatening mood.
10. I Will Not Permit It is a painful lyric. Its restless energy suggests the emotional conflict mixed with amorous desire.
11. First Kiss creates a mystical moment. The music swells and then suddenly evaporates.
12. Vine Climb describes the estate, now in abeyance to the protagonists’ mixed emotions.
13. Laying in Bluebells casts a dark, ominous presence of new life in the midst of suspicions of foul play. The last measures contain a screech of dire warning.
14. You Belong Here seems to allay Ambrose’s doubts, another summer idyll.
15. Broken Pearls begins with high, sustained tremors. Bass chords increasing threaten, but a tune offers uneasy reconciliation.
16. What I Lack is an idyll, extensive, wherein Ambrose tries to console himself in the midst of doubts.
17. Cliff Path introduces a fatal motif through romantic impulses that throb with danger.
18. Muggins is another character sketch, shimmering with danger.
19. Hallucinations is made from minor harmonies, high strings, and eerie percussion.
20. Laburnum is the poison tree Ambrose noticed in Italy, and now it appears on his estate. The music throbs with menace.
21. Follow that Horse is a moody, atmosphere piece, ripe for melodrama, a kind of perverse march.
22. Enlightenment reverts to the mood-swing motif, as Ambrose’s doubts and his desire to proclaim Rachel his salvation return.
23. Gallop to the Coast projects a dark, fatal, atmosphere.. The agitation increases to a fever pitch, a real march to the scaffold.
24. Who’s To Blame – Reprise returns to the doubts that plagued Ambrose. Will he ever be sure of dead Rachel’s guilt or innocence?
25. Suspicion features high, sustained, string pedal points; the piano contributes brief riffs as the tremolos sigh in dissonant harmonies.
26. My Torment defines Ambrose’s lingering doubts and self-accusations of his lack of faith in love. A sad waltz, it reminds him of “happy days” with his enigmatic Rachel.