Pierre Boulez (1925-2016)

[Sid]

I just got the Boulez DG cd with Sur Incises, Messagesquisse & Anthemes 2 (played by members of the Ensemble Intercontemporain conducted by the composer). I wanted to get to know Boulez's music more, but something a bit more approachable than his piano sonatas which I got about six months ago played by Idil Biret on Naxos (they were pretty challenging to listen to!). So I thought I'd get into his chamber & electro-acoustic music, so this mid-priced disc was perfect (& it has apparently won numberous awards).

The first two works on the cd seem to be in the same league as the sonatas as regarding their complexity, but I have only listened to them once each, so it's early days. But I listened to Anthemes 2 again this morning and it seemed pretty approachable. It's a work for solo violin and electronic realization. At times, you only hear the acoustic violin, but then it is joined by about 20 more overdubbed violins (so it sounds like a concerto) or just a few (a quartet). There is this part in the middle where the strings are plucked, but one quickly realises that this is too fast and mechanical, it could never be done by human hands. There is some dissonance here, but also lyricism and even wittiness (the pizzicato part).

I just began to get into electro-acoustic music in May, when I went to a concert here in Sydney by the local Ensemble Offspring, who play a lot of this kind of stuff. The concert featured works by Australian & international composers, some of whom had studied at IRCAM in Paris (which was set up by Boulez). Some of the composers were at the concert and talked about their works, and one of them was at the electronic console for the performance of his music. I liked those pieces, but I think another Australian composer, Mike Mikowski who does a lot of this kind of stuff is way too complex for where I'm at. But I'm glad that I was able to somewhat understand the Boulez piece, because I'll use this as a springboard to get into this genre more...

[CRCulver]

Unsurprisingly, this is the work's only recording

Nope. A recording on DVD came out a couple of months ago.

[petrarch]

Nope. A recording on DVD came out a couple of months ago.

If you are talking about the Inheriting the future of music DVD, it contains only excerpts.

[petrarch]

Sadly, the work's formidable demands - not only the virtuoso requirements of the score itself, but also the practical problem of transporting and assembling the relevant digital hardware, plus the difficulty of finding a concert hall big enough to stage it in - have meant that Répons has rarely been heard in performance.

I have seen Répons live and I wouldn't say it is more demanding logistically than your typical ensemble + live electronics piece. Although it certainly was a memorable experience, I find that Sur Incises is more interesting--more crafted--and if you get the Juxtapositions Boulez DVD, there is an invaluable section-by-section analysis and explanation of the piece (it's not always that you can get it straight from the master and with the best musicians in the world playing and replaying each passage ).

The altogether more modest Dialogue de l'ombre, for solo clarinet and electronics, completes the disc.

Dialogue de l'ombre double is indeed a tour-de-force of writing for solo clarinet; works best live, as would be expected, sounding a lot more expansive than the recorded version.

[petrarch]

Répons does have a unique spatial plot ... and the computer system/software etc. is (was?) pretty much specifically designed & taylored for that piece.

Not really. The 4X system was designed a few years before Répons and there are a few other works that used it. Nowadays IRCAM is mostly Mac/MAX-based and Répons itself no longer uses the 4X workstation. But you could say that there is a shared lineage there, as Andrew Gerzso, Boulez's engineer, was one of the original designers of the 4X, along with Miller Puckette, who would go on to "invent" MAX and later Pure Data.

[petrarch]

Interesting what other prominent works used this technology ... ? And one that has the spatial plot that Répons has ...

To be clear, I don't think any of the other works were as significant as Répons. Other composers have used the earlier iterations of the technology, e.g. Machover in his Light but also using the 4X are a series of works by Manoury, e.g. Pluton, Jupiter, Neptune and Partition du ciel et de l'enfer. For works with a rather complex spatialization scheme, there is Emmanuel Nunes' Lichtung series (the spatialization scheme is detailed in a book about the composer published by the IRCAM).

[petrarch]

Right ... then there is the special Matrix 32 lol  ... but ultimately it's the combination of all the various elements that i described earlier that make it's 'logistics' let's say unique, fair to say some of the reasons/excuses why it isn't performed a lot, and his most ambitious/extensive application of technology (i know there are others but nothing on the scale of this work) ... and with all the technological advances it no doubt will become easier to pull off.

Of course. I once sat behind Boulez when he was at the computer controlling the patches in MAX for a performance of ...explosante-fixe.... The Matrix 32 is an interesting rack, and even though it looks dated, it was an interesting sight to see it in operation in real-time (the spectrum analyser being the most visually obvious component).

Still, the Experimentalstudio hardware from the SWR is, aside from being more massive and extensive, a better live electronics set up, giving out a better experience. Just attend a concert of any of Nono's works with live electronics post 1980 and you'll know what I mean.

and i know there are plenty of works with a complex spatialization-surround-sound projection schemes (combined with technology or otherwise), i know you know Stockhausen ... & I don't think another composer worked with space on a level & so extensively as he did ... & he was really the first  to started doing all of this in a seriously significant & important way.

Right; my point was giving you an example of another work from roughly the same timeframe as Répons (well, really some 5 or 6 years later) that used more or less the exact same technology (also composed at the IRCAM in the 80s) and had spatialization built into the composition at a level that is as rich and complex as Répons (in a sense it is even more complex, as it makes use of 8 loudspeakers instead of 6 and has something that another composer has termed a solfège of spatialization).

[petrarch]

would you recommend that other stuff ... ?

It's worth trying, yes. Or, to put it differently, I wouldn't get rid of the CDs I have with that stuff . But Boulez is Boulez, Manoury is Manoury and Nunes is Nunes, so... open your ears.

[CRCulver]

would you recommend that other stuff ... ?

Manoury is definitely interesting, though those works sometimes strike me as so much mere electroacoustic demo that another, more talented composer (like Boulez) can turn into something fresh and exciting. Unfortunately, the only recording of Pluton, an Ondine disc, is now very out of print (probably only a handful of copies were ever pressed). But the Ades disc with "Jupiter" and "Partition" can still be found here and there.

[petrarch]

Répons is one of Boulez's best and i posted on it after Sid's post for obvious reasons ... would you say that the Manoury or Nunes stuff is the best of what they do, and some of the best "electro-acoustic" done.

That Manoury and that Nunes is probably among the best of what they have done, but taking it as representative is obviously a gross oversimplification. Is it the "best" electroacoustics?... I don't know. They work quite well, although it is generally accepted that Manoury is gimmicky whereas Nunes is more dense and uncompromising. My favourite electroacoustic music is more along the lines of Parmegiani, Dhomont and, on the live electronics front, Nono.

[Sid]

I got the Biret disc a few months ago, it was my first taste of Boulez, and I found it overwhelming. The second sonata is probably the most approachable for me, as it is in four contrasting movements. I'm totally out of my depth with the other two, but I will have to try & listen to the disc more (probably not straight through, just take the works seperately, bit by bit). I think this disc won a Diapason d'or, if I am not mistaken? I have not heard Pollini's account, and I might get that one too, sometime down the track.

But I found the chamber works disc on DG - Sur Incises, Messagesquisse, Anthemes 2 - to be far more approachable, especailly the last two works. There is much dissonance there, but also quite a bit of lyricism. I also like Anthemes 2 because I am just getting into electroacoustic music, I attended a concert of some recent works by Australian and international composers in May, and I really enjoyed it. Being surrounded by speakers which play music which is in dialogue with the live players is really an experience in itself.

[petrarch]

I got the Biret disc a few months ago, it was my first taste of Boulez, and I found it overwhelming. The second sonata is probably the most approachable for me, as it is in four contrasting movements. I'm totally out of my depth with the other two, but I will have to try & listen to the disc more (probably not straight through, just take the works seperately, bit by bit). I think this disc won a Diapason d'or, if I am not mistaken? I have not heard Pollini's account, and I might get that one too, sometime down the track.

But I found the chamber works disc on DG - Sur Incises, Messagesquisse, Anthemes 2 - to be far more approachable, especailly the last two works. There is much dissonance there, but also quite a bit of lyricism. I also like Anthemes 2 because I am just getting into electroacoustic music, I attended a concert of some recent works by Australian and international composers in May, and I really enjoyed it. Being surrounded by speakers which play music which is in dialogue with the live players is really an experience in itself.

Anthèmes 2 is quite approachable, indeed; if you liked it, you may want to give ...explosante-fixe... a try, as that is the work that is at its origin. However, I wouldn't say those works are electroacoustic music; for that, you should listen to e.g. some Bernard Parmegiani, François Bayle or Jean-Claude Risset (there are plenty of others, though). For some "lyrical" Boulez, try Le marteau sans maître or Pli selon pli.

[DavidRoss]

The composers who always interested me are the ones who, if they hadn't existed, music would have developed in completely different directions. Without Stravinsky, without Schoenberg, music today would be different. In contrast with them, there is the very good and highly respected composer Paul Hindemith. But if he hadn't written a note, would music today sound any different? No.

"I am not saying that we should silence composers like him. But we must understand that they are second-rate. Every generation makes its own discoveries. And if it doesn't, it absorbs the cliches of the past and uses only them; this is what we see among many composers today."

Bingo!

Sorry to hear that he's retired from conducting.  Glad that he's left a rich legacy of recordings.

[karlhenning]

I don't necessarily object to the idea of seating Hindemith with "The B Team."  I object to characterizing "The B Team" as "only using clichés absorbed from the past," and to Boulez's recycle-bin mentality towards the composers for whom he feels "no use."

Maybe Hindemith is a "grade-B" composer.  But that is much better than some of us are pretending.

I admire Boulez's compositing and enjoy his conducting, but none of us needs his taste-Nazi posturing.

[Franco]

I don't share his dismissive attitude towards composers like Paul Hindemith, or his need to rank composers "first rank; second rank; etc.". 

Hindemith did influence the history of music, both through his compositions and his books on music theory and composition.  Countless composers got their training through studying his texts and learning the basic craft of musical composition.  And Hindemith set a good example of the working composer who writes music to be played (and is still played), rather than works that exist in an abstract world of the mind.  Hindemith's many instrument sonatas are works that filled a void and supplied many musicians with good works for which there was not a lot of repertory.  The rare leading lights of a generation like a Stravinsky or a Schoenberg come along only once or twice in a century, but Hindemith and others like him are necessary to create the bulk of the music of the period. 

To say you are only interested in the innovative genuses is like saying you only eat foie gras.

Boulez loves to be provocative and I sense he has not outgrown that tendency, although I still consider him a musical giant despite this flaw.

[karlhenning]

I take it he still regards Shostakovich as "sixth-pressing Mahler" or whatever his characteristic sneer was.  It just ain't cute any more; the putz ought to grow up and join the adults.

[DavidRoss]

If you read on ... it's more of a semi-retirement or hiatus from conducting/reproducing to focus solely on composing/creating , he'll be returning 2014-15 ...

I did read on.  At his age whether he will even be alive four years from now is uncertain (as for all of us, but at 85 his life expectancy is only five years).

[Franco]

I don't need to read it again since I read it carefully enough the first time.

The composers who always interested me are the ones who, if they hadn't existed, music would have developed in completely different directions. Without Stravinsky, without Schoenberg, music today would be different. In contrast with them, there is the very good and highly respected composer Paul Hindemith. But if he hadn't written a note, would music today sound any different? No.

"I am not saying that we should silence composers like him. But we must understand that they are second-rate. Every generation makes its own discoveries. And if it doesn't, it absorbs the cliches of the past and uses only them; this is what we see among many composers today."

Boulez isn't particularly charitable when asked why he thinks they are not more original. "Perhaps they are tired, or lazy," he said. "It isn't easy to search and innovate and invent. You have to ask a lot of yourself, apply pressure, make demands all the time."

My comments stand.

[DavidRoss]

It seems again to me that we have differing notions of what "second-rate" means.  Some appear to see it as synonymous with "dreck."  Others see it as "not quite the best, but still pretty darned good"--like a second-growth Bordeaux.

If we classify every composer we like as "first-rate," does that mean we're unable to distinguish qualitative differences between Beethoven, say, and Dittersdorf?

[karlhenning]

In all events, he is tendentiously speculative when he opines that if Paul Hindemith had not written a note, music today would not sound any different.

Boulez is an intelligent chap; he ought to be able to distinguish between a fact and speculation.