The Percussions (Of Strasbourg)

The Percussions (Of Strasbourg) - The Percussions (Of Strasbourg)

In 1961 six percussionists trained at the National Conservatory in Paris met again at Strasbourg, reunited by their employment with the Municipal Orchestra and the radio and television studios. The increasingly important role of the percussion instruments in the music of today soon prompted them to form a sextette, "The Percussion-Instrument Group of Strasbourg," a name later shortened for convenience to "The Strasbourg Percussions." A firm friendship quickly developed among the six musicians as they enthusiastically shared the difficulties of getting started. From the first they subjected themselves to a rigorous schedule and that austere discipline which characterizes all of their work. By these means they intend to do justice to the modern importance of percussion instruments by presenting, in contemporary musical language, a repertory conceived exclusively for these instruments, without any orchestral aid. Their golden rule is always to avoid demonstrations of purely formal virtuosity. They make use of all instruments in each percussion category - skins, woods, metal. To the classical instruments - tympani, drums, cymbals, accessories - are added those specially created by the Group (chromatic series of rattles, manuals of bells, cencerros) and those of oriental origin (Chinese gongs, Siamese gongs, Japanese mokubyos, Indian tabla-tarengs). Their range covers 140 instruments in all. The group performs both recital works in solo without conductor and concert works and music accompanying choreography. It is the only ensemble of its kind in the world.

Miloslav Kabelac was born in Prague in 1908. At twenty he entered the Conservatory there, where he studied composition, conducting and piano. Working with the Czechoslovak broadcasting organization from 1932 onward, he was able also to continue a career in composition which he had begun the year before by writing a Sinfonietta for orchestra. From then on his creative activity was oriented principally toward two poles of equal importance for him: on the one hand, a considerable number of works for large orchestra, as well as cantatas and oratorios; on the other hand, works of more modest dimensions in which the world of childhood and popular idiom are elements of prime importance. This inquiring spirit whose interests included exotic musical forms was bound to sieze eagerly upon the problems of composition for a percussion ensemble appropriately strengthened for a role different from its usual one of component in an orchestra. With these Eight Inventions Kabelac finally achieved the mastery of this complex instrumentation. Each Invention is worked out in a specific mood which is exactly limned by the choice of musical material and its organization. The initial purpose of the composer is to mold a musical content utilizing to the full - while avoiding conventional cliches - the potentialities of percussion, first of all in rhythmic development but also, conjointly, from the points of view of melody and timbre. Written for the Strasbourg Percussions, the Eight Inventions were first performed on 22 April 1965 at the Strasbourg Municipal Theatre, with dances choreographed by Manuel Parres. Since then the Group has included the Inventions in numerous concert programs.

Research - which for Kabelac is a supplementary means of enlarging a range of expression, a research which in fact is quite adventitious - in [Maurice] Ohana has deeper roots which have supported a period of investigation and creation extending over more than twenty years of assiduous work: researches into micro-intervals, into the modification of certain traditional instruments such as the guitar and even into as yet unexploited possibilities of the voice and of phonetics. Born in Casablanca in 1914 of a family of Andalusian origin, after a year of study under Alfredo Casella at the Academy of St. Cecelia in Rome he has for more than thirty years made Paris the principal locus of his activities. Thus he can be regarded as one of the most characteristic composers of the young French school. From his Andalusian heritage he has retained, throughout the marked evolution of his musical language, a deep fidelity to the essentials of an art which is a product of millenary civilizations occupying the Mediterranean shores of Europe and North Africa, an art of which the archetypes belong to the dawn of time and are part of the origins of human thought. From an already long list evidencing great creative vitality we may cite Llanto, on a text by Lorca, for reader, baritone, chorus and orchestra (1949-1950), Cantigas for chorus and eighteen instruments (1953), Guitar Concerto (1950), Synaxis for four percussion instruments, two pianos and large orchestra (1966), Signes for four percussion instruments, flute, piano and zither in 1/3-tones (1965), a chamber opera Syllabary for Phaedra (1967), etc. The Four Etudes, originally intended for four players, was written at the invitation of the North-German Radio. The formation of the Strasbourg Group offered the composer the occasion to rework these Etudes for six percussionists, and they were first performed in this version at the 1963 Strasbourg Festival, with choreography - again by Manuel Parres - which invited the musicians to take part with the dancers in evolutions upon the stage. (Michel Bernard, from the liner notes)

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Corale [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {3:20}

2. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Giubiloso [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {1:44}

3. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Recitativo [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {2:36}

4. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Scherzo [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {1:50}

5. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Lamentoso [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {3:27}

6. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Danza [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {3:13}

7. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Aria [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {2:52}

8. 8 Inventions, Opus 45: Diabolico [composed by Miloslav Kabelac] {1:37}

Side 2

1. 4 Etudes Choreographiques: First Etude [composed by Maurice Ohana] {3:20}

2. 4 Etudes Choreographiques: Second Etude [composed by Maurice Ohana] {5:21}

3. 4 Etudes Choreographiques: Third Etude [composed by Maurice Ohana] {4:06}

4. 4 Etudes Choreographiques: Fourth Etude [composed by Maurice Ohana] {3:04}

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