"It's All Relative," by Patrick Blindauer

Editor's Comments

My favorite part about this theme is that it looks exceptionally simple until you hit the surprise reveal at the end.  Kudos to Patrick for building the suspense so well!  I also admire how he worked his performing arts voice into so many of the clues without jacking up their difficulty.  Even ordinary words like LIFE and THESE have nice, easy, music-related clues.  And finally, I appreciate how Patrick found contemporary cluing angles for such classic crossword entries as CHE and COCO.  Little touches like these are what make his work stand out so much.