Pierre Boulez (1925-2016)

[Joaquimhock]

According to Philippe Manoury who was interviewed yesterday on French radio, Boulez attended a rehearsal of Shostakovich orchestral songs by Muti in Chicago a few years ago and said "it was really interesting". Yes it seems he mellowed a bit... :-)

[Sergeant Rock]

I also saw from another article today that in the sixties and seventies Boulez would program CPE Bach up against Webern and Ockenham with his own music. There are always unexpected sides to such complex people.

Mike

A March 1965 Cleveland concert illustrates his unusual programming:

Rameau Concerts en sextuor, string orchestra, no. 6
Boulez Figures, doubles, prismes
Stravinsky Chant du rossignol
Debussy  Rondes de printemps

Sarge

[Karl Henning]

Some people can be very passioante about hosile takeovers, you know.   

Hah!

And then there is the customary dismissal of the Emerson String Quartet as (I paraphrase) "polished and accurate."  And I reply, yes, indeed, let's have more of that.

[Mirror Image]

According to Philippe Manoury who was interviewed yesterday on French radio, Boulez attended a rehearsal of Shostakovich orchestral songs by Muti in Chicago a few years ago and said "it was really interesting". Yes it seems he mellowed a bit... :-)

Yes, especially for a guy who called Shostakovich a 'third-pressing of Mahler'.

[knight66]

Lots of composers said very scathing things about other composers. His look meaner due to those criticised often being around to hear the opinions. Surely, for good and bad, he is what we might term a typical French intellectual, par for the course.

Mike

[André]

Boulez about other composers was no les scathing than Celibidache about other composers.

[Jay F]

How do you prounounce "Boulez?

booLAY?

booLEZZ?

BOOlis?

[Karl Henning]

It's pronounced Throat-Warbler Mangrove.

[(poco) Sforzando]

And Tchaikovsky called Brahms a giftless bastard; Britten said he played through all of Brahms periodically just to confirm how bad he was; Brahms ridiculed Bruckner for his start-and-stop forms; Weber thought Beethoven's later works proved he was ready for the madhouse; Stravinsky said of Richard Strauss that he didn't like the major works, and he didn't like the minor works; Schoenberg ridiculed Stravinsky as "der kleine Modernsky"; Mendelssohn was horrified by Berlioz; Richard Strauss IIRC said of Schoenberg that he'd be better off digging ditches. So what. Composers are under no obligation to be fair to other composers; they are only obligated to produce their own music. Composers are bound to have strong opinions, even strongly negative ones, towards other composers; if they didn't have such strong opinions, it's unlikely they would be such strong personalities themselves.

[(poco) Sforzando]

How do you prounounce "Boulez?

booLAY?

booLEZZ?

BOOlis?

booLEZZ

[Karl Henning]

Britten said he played through all of Brahms periodically just to confirm how bad he was.

Which was a 180-degree turn: in his younger days, Britten was a fan of Brahms.  Too much of a good thing...?

[(poco) Sforzando]

Boulez about other composers was no les scathing than Celibidache about other composers.

Do you mean other conductors? If so, Celibidache about other conductors was no less scathing than many listeners about Celibidache.

[Joaquimhock]

How do you prounounce "Boulez?

booLAY?

booLEZZ?

BOOlis?

http://fr.forvo.com/word/pierre_boulez/#fr

[André]

booLEZZ

Wrong. Both the boo and lezz must be short, not long.

Try to pronounce it in exactly one second, and you'll get it right when speaking conversationally. If you just name the name or pronounce it the end of a sentence you may extend it to 2 seconds for emphasis. Longer than that you'll sound like an American

[(poco) Sforzando]

Wrong. Both the boo and lezz must be short, not long.

Try to pronounce it in exactly one second, and you'll get it right when speaking conversationally. If you just name the name or pronounce it the end of a sentence you may extend it to 2 seconds for emphasis. Longer than that you'll sound like an American

bu-LEZ, then. I picked the closest of the three alternatives offered (sounded Z, second syllable stress). I have armed myself with a stopwatch and can assure you that even though I am one, I do not sound like an American.

[Cato]

From today's (January 7, 2016) Wall Street Journal by MIT professor Tod Machover:

...I was fortunate to experience the intersection of Mr. Boulez's activities when I worked at his Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique (Ircam), from 1978 to 1985. He invited me there at first as a kind of "guinea pig" to try the new technology, then named me Ircam's first director of musical research.

Although Mr. Boulez had trained in mathematics and science as well as in music, he had been less successful than others in his generation—which included such giants as Karlheinz Stockhausen—in creating innovative electronic music. He was one of the great orchestrators of instrumental music of the 20th century—and he felt that postwar electronic technology was inadequate. So he'd created Ircam to bring composers, instrumentalists, engineers and scientists together to invent the sounds, structures and systems to make possible the music he imagined.

At Ircam, Mr. Boulez approached electronic composition almost as a student, taking notes on exactly how each new process worked, looking to understand the furthest and most precise potential of machine intelligence, rehearsing each effect until it sounded splendid, and then adapting his musical sketches accordingly...

(After a power outage of 20 minutes right before the premiere of "Répons")   Mr. Boulez had remained cool and collected; the performance had to go on. This time, all went flawlessly. The six soloists entered with crashing electronics, and the performance proceeded to the end. With no break, Mr. Boulez gave the lecture-demo and then played "Répons" a second time.

I—and many others—immediately knew that we had heard a masterpiece. And we had also observed Mr. Boulez at his best: pursuing great risk for his art; remaining calm and charming in adversity; graciously supporting his team and his machines; preparing meticulously for the moment that mattered, knowing not everything can be controlled.

Through these qualities, Pierre Boulez marked the music and culture of our times. He has left a legacy as a bold fighter for the seriousness, sophistication and transformative power of music at a moment when we have often forgotten how—or don't have the time—to really listen..

See:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/pierre-boulez-1925-2015-champion-of-art-and-tech-1452123500

[pjme]

How do you prounounce "Boulez?

booLAY?

booLEZZ?

BOOlis?

Listen :

https://www.youtube.com/v/w38EGBn9wzw

or

https://www.youtube.com/v/JriFc4QeS6E

[Jay F]

booLEZZ

http://fr.forvo.com/word/pierre_boulez/#fr

Wrong. Both the boo and lezz must be short, not long.

Try to pronounce it in exactly one second, and you'll get it right when speaking conversationally. If you just name the name or pronounce it the end of a sentence you may extend it to 2 seconds for emphasis. Longer than that you'll sound like an American

bu-LEZ, then. I picked the closest of the three alternatives offered (sounded Z, second syllable stress). I have armed myself with a stopwatch and can assure you that even though I am one, I do not sound like an American.

Listen :

https://www.youtube.com/v/w38EGBn9wzw

or

https://www.youtube.com/v/JriFc4QeS6E

Thanks to you all. I studied French in high school and college, and I thought "lez" was pronounced "lay." Have I misremembered? Is this pronunciation an exception to the rule?

[(poco) Sforzando]

Thanks to you all. I studied French in high school and college, and I thought "lez" was pronounced "lay." Have I misremembered? Is this pronunciation an exception to the rule?

Can't explain it off the top of my head, but it may be a regionalism typical of the central area of France where B. was born. Cf. Berlioz, whose name is also pronounced with the Z and who was born close to Boulez's home town of Montbrison.

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

Do you mean other conductors? If so, Celibidache about other conductors was no less scathing than many listeners about Celibidache.

I like conductors whose names I can pronounce

Just kidding I love Celibidache as well!