Domaines

Pierre Boulez - Domaines

reissued on CD in 1988, original release date 1971 (likely copied from a vinyl copy)

performed by Ensemble Musique Vivante under the direction of Diego Masson

clarinet solo: Michel Portal

...originally intended for solo clarinet when it was premiered in 1968. Two years later, Pierre Boulez adopted a circular arrangement made up of six instrumental units, with the clarinet as the sixth of these. The result is a structure in two large sections - original and mirror - directly derived from the dialogue between 'the protagonists' (in this case, Michel Portal) and each of the groups of instruments. (notes taken from 2001 reissue)

Tracklisting:

1. Premiere Partie  {15:38}

2. Seconde Partie  {14:38}

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Boulez/Webern-Piano Sonata No.2/Piano Variations (1973) Finnadar

Pierre Boulez was born in 1925.He celebrates his 87th birthday today..

Boulez (rather paradoxically) said of his Piano Sonata No 2 that it represented
"a total and deliberate break with the universe of classical twelve-tone writing,the decisive step towards in integrated serial work, that will be realized when serial structures of tone-colors and dynamics will join serial structures of pitch and rhythm."(Boulez quote from Joseph Machlis's "Introduction To Contemporary Music", W.W.Norton & Co. 1961)

From the cover notes:

With Pierre Boulez's Second Piano sonata Idil Biret not only makes her American recording debut ,but also presents the first U.S. recording of this important contemporary work- It was previously recorded in Europe by Yvonne Loriod for Vega and by Claude Heiffer for Deutsche Grammophon. Composed in 1948, this Sonata occupies a position that exerted a causative influence upon Boulez's subsequent music.It's experimental and ground-breaking nature may be better understood if one regards it as having grown out of a response to Webern's Variations (1936), the companion piece on this album. The rigid, geometric patterns of Webern's work,the classical purity of its encompassing organization, seem to have served as a base of departure for Boulez's broadened structures which are equally rigid but incomparably more complex. It is this very complexity which conceals the strict framework of the entire composition and projects it as the product of an ardent improvisatory impetus.It demands form its interpreter a similar approach, along with technical prowess and intellectual control of the highest order.It was only a matter of course that this work, together with influences emanating from other sources (chiefly that of John Cage) should lead the path not only to open-form and aleatory compositions, including Boulez's own Third Piano Sonata,but also, through its new pianistic language, urge the development of a whole new generation of virtuoso pianists, such as Aloys and Alfons Kontarsky, Marcelle Mercenier,Frederic Rzewski,David Tudor and Charles Wuorinen.


Side One:

a1-3:Pierre Boulez-Piano Sonata No.2 (1948)
1-Extremely Fast
2-Slow
3-Moderate,Almost Lively

Side Two

b1:4-Very Freely,with Brusque Oppositions of Movements and Nuances

b2-b4: Anton Webern-Variations For Piano, Opus 27
1-Very Moderate
2-Very Fast
3-Quietly Flowing

Idil Biret-Piano






















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Edgar Varese-BOULEZ CONDUCTS VARESE (1977) Columbia Masterworks

Edgar Varese-BOULEZ CONDUCTS VARESE (Columbia Masterworks 1977)
(This L.P. won the Grammy award in 1979 for "Best engineered Classical Album").

I've made this post so large in order to give folks a look at the orchestration- the percussion section is of particular interest to me. The wire sculpture at the bottom is by Alexander Calder. (All photos were acquired by searching "Edgar Varese photos".)

wiki sez: (Wiki articles are accessible by clicking on titles)

Edgard Victor Achille Charles Varèse, French pronunciation: [ɛdgaːʁ viktɔːʁ aʃil ʃaʁl vaʁɛːz], whose name was also spelled Edgar Varèse[1] (December 22, 1883 – November 6, 1965), was an innovative French-born composer who spent the greater part of his career in the United States.

Varèse's music emphasizes timbre and rhythm. He was the inventor of the term "organized sound", a phrase meaning that certain timbres and rhythms can be grouped together, sublimating into a whole new definition of music. Although his complete surviving works only last about three hours, he has been recognized as an influence by several major composers of the late 20th century. His use of new instruments and electronic resources led to his being known as the "Father of Electronic Music" while Henry Miller described him as "The stratospheric Colossus of Sound".

From the back cover notes (enclosed):

Ionisation was first performed at a Carnegie Hall concert March 6,1933. With Nicolas Slonimsky conducting.It was received with enormous enthusiasm by one part of the audience and whit horror - struck puzzlement by the other.
The Impact of the new work seemed all the greater for its brevity: it lasts barely six minutes.(...)

Ionisation (1929–1931) features the expansion and variation of rhythmic cells, and the title refers to the ionization of molecules. As the composer later described, "I was not influenced by composers as much as by natural objects and physical phenomena."
Varèse also acknowledged the influence of the Italian Futurist artists Luigi Russolo and Filippo Tommaso Marinetti in the composition of this work.

Arcana is based on a single idea, which Varese called an idee fixe rather than a conventionally symphonic theme. This "obsessive idea" consists of eleven notes, which are basically only three: and ascending minor third repeated in a syncopated rhythm.

Amériques Was written between 1918 and 1921 and revised in 1927, it is scored for a very large, romantic orchestra with additional percussion (for eleven performers) including sirens. It was the first work Varèse composed after he moved to the United States, and although it was not his first work, he destroyed many of his earlier pieces, effectively making Amériques his opus one (although he never used that designation).[1]

Structurally, the work is in one movement which lasts for around twenty-three minutes, with full orchestral involvement virtually throughout. The work is marked by its fiercely dissonant chords, and rhythmically complex polyphonies for percussion and wind. It develops in continuous evolution with recurring short motifs, which are juxtaposed without development.
Varèse intended the title Amériques to symbolize "discoveries - new worlds on earth, in the sky, or in the minds of men."

Amériques is scored for the following very large orchestra with additional percussion:

Woodwinds

3 Piccolos
4 Flutes
Alto Flute
4 Oboes
English Horn
Heckelphone
E-flat clarinet
4 Clarinets in B-flat
Bass Clarinet
Contrabass Clarinet
4 Bassoons
2 Contrabassoons

Brass
8 Horns in F6 Trumpets
4 Tenor Trombones
Bass Trombone
Bass Tuba
2 Contrabass Tubas

Percussion
Timpani (2 players)



13 Percussion Players

1: Xylophone, Triangle, Ratchet, Sleigh Bells
2: Glockenspiel, Lion's Roar, Ratchet, Whip
3: Tambourine, Gong
4: Celesta, 2 Bass Drums, Slapsticks, Gong, Triangle, Lion's Roar
5: 2 Bass Drums, Slapsticks
6: Castanets, Sleigh Bells
7: Sleigh Bells, Siren, Boat Whistle, Wind Machine
8: Cymbals, Gong
9: Snare Drum
10: Crow Call, Sleigh Bells, Lion's Roar,
Wind Machine, Triangle, Slapsticks
11: Slapsticks, Lion's Roar, Sleigh Bells, Whip
12: Whip, Triangle, Slapsticks, Wind Machine
13: Sleigh Bells, Slapsticks, Gong, Triangle

"Interior Fanfare"
4 Trumpets (2 in E-flat, 2 in D)
3 Trombones (2 Tenor, Bass)

Strings
2 Harps

Violins I, II (16 each)
Violas (14)
Violoncellos (10)
Double basses (10) (with low C extensions)

The revised version of 1927 reduced the instrumentation.(...)























Edgard Varese- BOULEZ CONDUCTS VARESE (CBS Records, 1977)

Side One:
1: Ameriques (1918-'21, Rev. 1927) (24:44)

Side Two:
2: Ionisation (1929-31) (6:07)
3: Arcana (1927) (18:22)

The New York Philharmonic,
Conducted by Pierre Boulez.



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Igor Stravinsky- STRAVINSKY PAR BOULEZ (Orig..1961)

Stravinsky Par Boulez (ADES 197? - orig. 1962)

From the back cover notes (in French - enclosed):

The works contained in this album were composed between 1914 and 1920,. THis period in Stravinsky's work was named "The Russian Period", but only after the fact. However, during this time he lived in Switzerland, in Salvan, Clarens and Morges; and he composed about fifteen works starting with the Three Pieces For String Quartet (1914) through Renard and Les Noces (1917), to L'Histoire du Soldat and finally Three Pieces For Clarinet (1919). It was in France that he wrote the Concertino For String Quartet and the Symphony For Wind Instruments which ended this period in 1920.
-Andre Schaeffner (Tranlation: Dr.I)

Some observations:
These chamber works, with their stripped-to-the-bone orchestration and tight directness of expression are perfectly suited to the Domaine Musicale under the direction of Pierre Boulez. The dry, direct quality of the recording highlights this well.

Renard; the relatively unheard barnyard fable is a treat, with it's cranky instrumentation and it's caricatured vocals and onomatopoeic touches. And the Concertino For Twelve Istruments (a 1952 Transcription of the 1920 Concertino For String Quartet) has, in my experience, never sounded better.
-Dr.I

Side One:

A1: Renard (Histoire burlesque chantée et jouée) 1916-17 (15:01)

(Cimbalom – Elemer Kiss
Bass Vocals – Louis-Jacques Rondeleux, Xavier Depraz
Libretto By – Igor Stravinsky
Tenor Vocals – Jean Giraudeau, Louis Devos
Conductor [Direction] – Pierre Boulez
French Translation Of Libretto – C.-F. Ramuz)


A2-5: 3 Pièces For String Quartet (1914)

No.1-Danse (:57)
No.2-Excentrique (1:55)
No.3-Cantique (3:34)

(Violins – Jacques Ghestem, Jacques Parrenin
Viola – Michel Walès
Cello – Pierre PenassouEnsemble – Quatuor Parrenin)

Side Two:

B1: 3 Pièces For Clarinet (1919)
1- (1:46)
2- (1:02)
3- (1:13)

(Clarinet – Guy Deplus)


B2: Concertino For 12 Instruments (1952 revision of Concertino for String Quartet from 1920)

(Trombone [Bass] – Maurice Suzan
Oboe – Claude Maisonneuve
Bassoon – André Rabot, Jean-Pierre Laroque
Flute – Jacques Castagner
Trombone [Tenor] – René Allain
Cello – Pierre Penassou
English Horn – Paul Taillefer
Violin – Jacques Parrenin
Clarinet – Guy Deplus
Trumpet – Jacques Lecointre, Pierre Pollin
Conductor [Direction] – Pierre Boulez )


B3: Symphony For Wind Instruments (1920 - rév. 1947)
("In Memory of Claude-Achille Debussy")

Conductor– Pierre Boulez



















Composed By – Igor Stravinsky
Performed By - Orchestre Du Domaine Musicale
Coordinator [Collection Conducted by] – Pierre Boulez
Layout – Maurice Tapiero
Liner Notes [French] – André Schaeffner, Pierre Boulez
Producer – Lucien Adès
Recording Supervisor – Jacques Pradère

Recorded at Studios Europa-Sonor, Paris

Stereo version: ADES 16-010
Originally released in mono in 1961
'
re-up:
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Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum/Couleurs de la cite celeste

Olivier Messiaen - Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum/Couleurs de la cite celeste

released on LP

I borrowed this LP a few years ago and ripped it then. The cover was beat up so I had to "borrow" the cover from somewhere on the net. The back cover has a little bit of handwriting on it. I do not know what the dates refer to (maybe when the music was recorded), but it was nice that someone wrote how to pronounce Olivier Messiaen's name.

Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum ("And I await the Resurrection of the Dead")

On the back cover, the entirety of side 1 is referred to as the beginning and the first track on side 2 is referred to as the conclusion.

Conducted by Pierre Boulez.
Performed by Groupe Instrumental a Percussion de Strasbourg and Orchestre du Domaine Musical.

This work was commissioned by André Malraux. It was composed and orchestrated in 1964. Its instrumentation intends it for vast spaces: churches, cathedrals, and even performances in the open air and on mountain heights....
It is perhaps useful to recall that, at the time he was writing his score, the composer gladly surrounded himself with strong and simple pictures - of the stepped pyramids of Mexico, the temples and statues of Ancient Egypt, Romanesque and Gothic churches; that he re-read the texts of St. Thomas Aquinas on "The Resurrection" and "The World of the Resuscitated"; that he worked in the high Alps, facing those powerful landscapes that are his true homeland.
May 7, 1965, at eleven o'clock in the morning: the date of the first, private, performance at the Sainte-Chapelle. This was the ideal setting for the work, as much for the marriage of the colors of the instrumental timbres and sonorous intricacies with the resplendence of blues, reds, gold and purples, as for the alternating resonances due to the encircling of the stained-glass windows. A second performance took place under the direction of Serge Baudo in the Cathédral de Notre Dame de Chartres before a large throng on Sunday, June 20, 1965, at the end of High Mass. This was given in the presence of Monseigneur Michon (the Bishop of Chartres) and of Général Charles de Gaulle. The third performance was given in Paris, at a concert of the Domaine Musical, under the direction of Pierre Boulez, with the players who take part in the present recording. The orchestra comprises three ensembles: woodwind, brass, and metallic percussion instruments. (from the liner notes)

Woodwind: 2 piccolos, 3 flutes, 3 oboes, 1 cor anglais, 1 E-flat clarinet, 3 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon

Brass: 1 trumpet in D, 3 trumpets, 6 horns in F, 3 trombones, 1 bass trombone, 1 tuba, 1 bass saxhorn in B flat

Metallic Percussion: 3 sets of tuned cowbells, tubular bells, 6 gongs, 3 tam-tams

Couleurs de la cité céleste

Conducted by Pierre Boulez. Performers: Yvonne Loriod - piano ; Guy Deplus - first clarinet ; André Fournier - second clarinet ; Gaston Derytere - third clarinet ; Georges Van Gucat - xylophone ; Claude Ricou - xylorimba ; Jean Batigne - marimba ; Pierre Thibaud - trumpet in D ; René Allain - first trombone ; Jean-Paul Finkbeiner -tubular bells

These "inner colors" spring from five quotations from the Apocalypse:
1. "And there was a rainbow round about the throne." (Revelations IV: 3)
2. "And the seven angels had seven trumpets." (Revelations VIII: 6)
3. "And to the star was given the key to the bottomless pit." (Revelations IX: 1)
4. "And the light of the Holy City was like a jasper stone, clear as crystal." (Revelations XXI: 11) 5. "And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones: jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald, sardonyx, sardius, chrysolite, beryl, topaz, chrysoprasus, jacinth, amethyst." (Revelations XXI: 19, 20)

The form of the piece depends entirely on colors. The themes, melodic or rhythmic, the complexes of sounds and timbres evolve like colors. In their perpetually renewed variations can be found (by analogy) colors that are warm and cold, complementary colors that influence their neighbors, shading down to white, or toned down by black. These transformations can be compared to the superimposition of plays enacted on several stages, the simultaneous unfolding of several different stories.

Plainsong Alleluias, Greek and Hindu rhythms, permutations of note values, the birdsong of different countries: all these accumulated materials are placed at the service of color and of the combinations of sounds that assume and call out for it.

The sound-colors, in their turn, are a symbol of the Celestial City and of Him who dwells there. Above all time, above all place, in a light without light, in a night without night.... That which the Apocalypse, still more terrifying in its humility than in its visions of glory, describes only in a blaze of colors.... To the song of two New Zealand birds (the Tui-Bird and the Bell-Bird) is opposed "the Abyss," with its pedal-notes for the trombones and the resonance of tam-tams. To the cries of the Brazilian Araponga is opposed "the colored ecstasy" of pedal points: sard red - red flecked with blue - orange, gold, milky-white - emerald green, amethyst violet - purple violet and blue violet... The work ending no differently from the way it began, but turning on itself like a rosewindow of flamboyant and invisible colors.

Couleurs de la cité céleste was composed in 1963. First performed on October 17, 1964, at the Donaueschingen Festival, under the direction of Pierre Boulez, the work was repeated on December 11, 1964, in Brussels (at the Reconnaissance des Musiques Modernes Festival), then in Paris on December 16, 1964, at a concert of the Domaine Musical, again under the direction of Pierre Boulez. In all these performances, Yvonne Loriod played the solo piano part. (from the liner notes by Olivier Messiaen)

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: I. Des profondeurs de l'abîme, je crie vers toi, Seigneur: Seigneur, écoute ma voix! ("Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord: Lord, hear my voice.") (Psalm 130: 1, 2) {3:39}

2. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: II. Le Christ, ressuscite des morts, ne meurt plus; la mort n'a plus sur lui d'empire ("Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.") (St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans VI: 9) {5:21}

3. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: III. L'Heure vient où les morts entendront la voix du Fils de Dieu ("The hour is coming when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God.") (St. John V: 25) {4:50}

4. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: IV. Ils ressusciteront, glorieux, avec un nom nouveau dans le concert joyeux des étoiles et les acclamations des fils du ciel ("They shall be raised in glory, with a new name, when the morning stars sing together, and all the sons of God shout for joy.") (St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians XV: 43; The Revelations of St. John II: 17; Job XXXVIII: 7) {8:41}

Side 2

1. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: V. Et j'entendis la voix d'une foule immense... ("And I heard the voice of a great multitude.") (The Revelation of St John XIX: 6) {6:37}

2. Coleurs de la cite celeste {16:44}

(1)

Avant Garde Piano REPOST

various artists compilation - Avant Garde Piano

released on LP

David Burge - piano

LUCIANO BERIO - Sequenza IV (1966)

Luciano Berio completed Sequenza IV during the spring of 1966, thereby adding another work to his series of solo Sequenze (the first is for flute, the second for harp, the third for voice, the fourth for piano, the fifth for trombone, and the sixth for viola.) In each of these compositions the composer has written a work of substance that is unique to its specific repertory. Having first thoroughly reassessed the potential of the given instrument (or voice, in the case of Sequenza III), he then seizes on those particular capabilities that best suit his extraordinary imagination and proceeds to develop them in an organic manner.

LUIGI DALLAPICCOLA - Quaderno Musicale di Annalibera (1952)

For purity of melodic expression, few recent piano compositions can rival the Quaderno Musicale by Luigi Dallapiccola. Written in the classical twelve-tone technique, it has already become a "classic" work in the repertory. The work was commissioned by the Pittsburgh International Contemporary Music Festival in 1952, and "is dedicated to my dear daughter Annalibera on the day of her eighth birthday."

The title, Musical Notebook for Annalibera, is not without reference to another Musical Notebook - that for Anna Magdalena Bach. In fact, in the first movement one may hear the familiar B-A-C-H figure (always, however, transposed from the usual B-flat starting point - would the fastidious Italian have found such an overly direct homage ostentatious?) Like Bach, Dallapiccola is concerned with counterpoint; three of the succeeding ten movements are strict canons.

KARLHEINZ STOCKHAUSEN - Klavierstuck VIII (1954)

As is the case with all the music on this recording, Karlheinz Stockhausen's Klavierstuck VIII is notated with extreme care with regard to pitches, rhythms, and dynamics. The ninety-six-second span of the work is articulated by assymmetrical phrases of great activity interspersed with moments of repose, the latter invariably consisting of single pitches which, however, are never of the same duration. This balance between activity and repose gives shape to the characteristically abstract, spatial nature of the music.

PIERRE BOULEZ - Premiere Sonate (1947)

The First Sonata by Pierre Boulez is an early work, often overshadowed by the massive Second Sonata and the fantastic maze which constitutes the Third. Astonishing in itself, the First Sonata is even more impressive when one considers the youth of its author and the time of its writing (the first two years after the cultural ravages of World War II). It is often said that this work and the early Flute Sonatine show the strong influence of Webern; this may be so, but it is an assertive, flamboyant type of Webernism unknown in the older composer's works.
...
The piano writing itself is remarkable. Virtually the entire keyboard is utilized at all times, especially in the rapid sections. In other passages a new kind of counterpoint depends for its effect not at all on the progress of individual voices, which are essentially unheard, but on the resultant sound of several equal voices moving at unequal speeds.
While Boulez continues to use bar lines in this and several succeeding works, they are not meant to imply metrical accents but are inserted "as visual aids" to the performer. Several summers ago I had a visit from Ernst Krenek at a time when I was preparing the First Sonata. I recall with amusement an hour or so during which I played passages over and over while that marvelous gentleman, in a flaming orange shirt, brown shorts, and sandals, strode around the room in a most concerned manner as he tried to coax me into completely eliminating any semblance of beat or bar line accent.

ERNST KRENEK - Sechs Vermessene (1958)

Krenek's own Sechs Vermessene also employ bar lines, and the pitches, rhythms, durations, densities, and dynamics are achieved by a process of serialization that is as close to "total" as is humanly possible. Thus, in a certain sense, the music is "composed" before a single note is set down (one may be reminded, obliquely, of the title of Machaut's rondeau: "Ma fin est mon commencement, et mon commencement ma fin"). Due to the complexity of the serialization, and in spite of the clarity of Krenek's notational solutions, some formidable performance problems, especially rhythmic, are presented to the pianist. Therefore it is interesting to note that the effect of much of the Six Measurements is that of random improvisation, a fact that genuinely delights the composer! (David Burge)



Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. Luciano Berio - Sequenza IV {9:23}

2. Luigi Dallapiccola - Quaderno Musicale di Annalibera {12:47}

Side 2

1. Karlheinz Stockhausen - Klaveierstuck VIII {1:36}

2. Pierre Boulez - Premiere Sonate {9:06}

3. Ernst Krenek - Sechs Vermessene {10:58}

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Dal niente

Eduard Brunner - Dal niente

recorded October 1995, released 1997

Eduard Brunner - clarinet

The composition Piri by Isang Yun, originally scored for the oboe, exploits the nuances of the single tone in a manner characteristic of East Asian music. Eduard Brunner transforms it into a paradigmatic clarinet piece.
...
Igor Stravinsky recommended the A clarinet with its darker timbre in the first two of his Three Pieces for Clarinet. The deep register thus has the effect of a Gedackt organ stop in the first of the three miniatures. The second piece as well as the third, which is played in the Bb clarinet, recall the puppet and fairy-tale world of Petrushka and The Soldier's Tale with their airy, lightfooted, prancing figurations. Stravinsky jotted down the following previously unpublished miniature of five measures on a decorative telegram with the works "Apprille Rome 1917." It is dedicated to Picasso.
...
The Domaines by Pierre Boulez, also existant in a version for orchestra, illustrate the aleatory practice used by the composer to counteract the danger of formal rigidity inherent in serial thinking. According to the instructions in the score, the soloist is at liberty to decide on the order of the six Cahiers designated as Original, followed by six Miroirs (although "palindrome" would be an equally appropriate designation since most of these are reversed forms of the Originals).
...
In Freundshaft (In Friendship), composed for the clarinettist Suzanne Stephens, was designed by Karlheinz Stockhausen so that it can be played by different solo instruments. The piece is composed in three layers, as horizontal polyphony.
...
In Preghiera per un'ombra, Giacinto Scelsi also works with layers and registers in structuring the sound space. But instead of adhering to a strictly multilayered model, he lays a melodic trail by playing around single notes that recur elsewhere in the space of the sound, like hidden paths.
...
Like Accanto for clarinet and orchestra, composed for Eduard Brunner in 1976, which also investigated the realm of pure sound, Helmut Lachenmann's Dal niente (Interieur III) also exploits the entire spectrum of possibilities contained in the clarinet. . . . Lachenmann's penchant for the shadowside, for rough surfaces, hollowed sounds or what might be called the unlit side of sound, could be interpreted as a musical version of Brecht's visual metaphors - "Those in the shadows remain unseen" - or perhaps only as an expression of scepticism towards the hackneyed language of conventional notions of the beautiful tone. And yet these sounds bespeak the power of musical invention. (Max Nyffeler)

Tracklisting:

1. Piri {10:25}
composed by Isang Yun

2. Three Pieces for Clarinet Solo: I {1:30}
composed by Igor Stravinsky

3. Three Pieces for Clarinet Solo: II {1:08}
composed by Igor Stravinsky

4. Three Pieces for Clarinet Solo: III {1:19}
composed by Igor Stravinsky

5. Piece for Clarinet Solo {0:38}
composed by Igor Stravinsky

6. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier A Original {0:43}
composed by Pierre Boulez

7. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier D Original {1:00}
composed by Pierre Boulez

8. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier F Original {2:29}
composed by Pierre Boulez

9. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier E Original {0:57}
composed by Pierre Boulez

10. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier B Original {1:38}
composed by Pierre Boulez

11. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier C Original {0:54}
composed by Pierre Boulez

12. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier C Miroir {0:58}
composed by Pierre Boulez

13. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier D Miroir {1:05}
composed by Pierre Boulez

14. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier E Miroir {1:03}
composed by Pierre Boulez

15. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier A Miroir {0:54}
composed by Pierre Boulez

16. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier B Miroir {1:21}
composed by Pierre Boulez

17. Domaines pour clarinette seule: Cahier F Miroir {2:38}
composed by Pierre Boulez

18. In Freundschaft {12:32}
composed by Karlheinz Stockhausen

19. Preghiera per un'ombra {11:04}
composed by Giacinto Scelsi

20. Dal niente (Interieur III) {16:16}
composed by Helmut Lachenmann

(1) or (1) (2) or (2) [links coming back soon, (1/22/2012)]

Olivier Messiaen/Arnold Schoenberg split release

Olivier Messiaen/Arnold Schoenberg - split release

All music on LP performed by Domaine Musicale Orchestra, conducted by Pierre Boulez

Other performers on "Seven Haikai":

Yvonne Loriod - piano
Strassbourg Percussion Ensemble

SEVEN HAIKAI

This work was written in 1962, following a trip to Japan. Although no poems are included in it, the title HAIKAI denotes that the seven pieces are short, like the Japanese poems bearing that name. The dedication, on the other hand, is long, but bears citation:

"TO YVONNE LORIOD, TO PIERRE BOULEZ, TO MME. FUMI YAMAGUCHI, TO SEIJI OZAWA, TO YORITSUNE MATSUDAIRA, TO SANDAU BEKKU AND MITSUAKI HAYAMA, TO THE ORNITHOLOGIST HOSHINO, TO THE LANDSCAPE, TO THE MUSIC, AND TO ALL THE BIRDS OF JAPAN."

Here is a brief analysis of each of the seven pieces:

I - INTRODUCTION

Cencerros, bells, trumpet, trombone and metallic percussion introduce Indian rhythms dedicated to the three Shakti. The piano and woodwinds play a retrograded rhythmic canon. The xylophone and marimba play a Metabole of the Tala Simhavikrama (force of the lion) and of Tala Micra-Varna (mixture of colors). The violins then play a melodic phrase, of which we hear only the first strophe (the second strophe is heard in the seventh piece).

II - THE PARK OF NARA AND THE STONE LANTERNS

The Nara region in Japan. Four Buddhist temples in a park. Does and stags roam about freely. The sun's rays play among the Cryptomerias along the main path. 3,000 stone lanterns press together and out of view.

III - Yamanaka - CADENZA

The birds singing in this place were heard in the forest near Lake Yamanaka at the foot of Mount Fuji. They are almost the same birds heard in the sixth piece, but one must add Misoszai, a Japanese Troglodyte portrayed by the xylophone, and Aka-Hara, a red-sided thrush, portrayed by the English horn. Aoji, a Japanese masked bird and Oruri, a blue Japanese fly eater were observed at Subashiri. The three piano "cadenzas" portray successively:
(a) first cadenza: KIBITKA, a narcissistic fly eater;
(b) second cadenza: HOAKA, a grey-headed bird and Hibari, a Japanese meadow-sparrow;
(c) third cadenza: KURU TSUGUMI, a Japanese blackbird.

IV - GAGAKU

GAGAKU is the noble Japanese music of the VIIth century. It is still performed at the Imperial court. We hear only the two main timbres of this music: SHO (mouth organ), replaced by an ensemble of 8 violins, and HICHIRIKI (primitive oboe), replaced by trumpet.

V - MIYAJIMA AND THE TORII IN THE SEA

This is perhaps the most beautiful spot in Japan. It is a mountain island covered with dark green Japanese pines and maples that turn red in autumn. A Shinto Temple, white and red, with a great red portal opening onto the deep blue sea. To all these colors, the musical harmonies of woodwinds, brass, violins and bells (and also the resources of CROTALES, piano and triangle) add other combinations: grey and orange-gold, silvery red, lilac and violet-purple.

VI - THE BIRDS OF KARUIZAWA

The birds singing in this piece were heard in the vicinity of Karuizawa, in a mountain and Japanese pine setting. Some were heard in the woods, near a gorge and a small stream not far from the Asama volcano, where bright-red azaleas flourish. Some of the main birds are:
(a) UGUISO, a Japanese songbird that has two songs: the first is a long, swelling note, followed by a victorious, rapidly descending trill and continuing in a third, interrupted and repeated many times, slowing progressively. UGUISO is represented by the trumpet and woodwind ensemble. (b) HOTOTOGUISO, a small grey-headed cuckoo that sings an odd fanfare of five or six notes. HOTOTOGUISO is represented by trombone, bassoons and clarinet.
(c) KIBITAKI, a narcissistic fly eater whose song is of repeated strophes, sometimes quite numerous. Its plumage is yellow-orange and black, a great yellow brown, great white spots on the wings. KIBITAKI is played by four clarinets, as well as xylophone and marimba.
(d) ORURI, a blue Japanese fly eater. Its head and coat are blue, and the belly white, throat and breast black.
(e) AOJI, a Japanese masked bird, whose song consists of rapid, separated leaps.
(f) SAN KO CHO, another fly eater with head and throat of violet-black, white belly, a reddish-brown coat, and a pale-blue circle around each eye, with a very long tail. SAN KO CHO is played by xylophone and marimba.
(g) KURO TSUGUMI, the Japanese blackbird, whose varied song differs from that of the European blackbird.
(h) MEJIRO, a bird of tender green plumage with white circles about its eyes. In the piano cadenzas we hear BINZUI, Hodgson's songbird, and O-YOSHIKIRI, a reddish oriental bird. There are at least a dozen other Japanese birds heard in this work.

VII - CODA

Given by the CENCERROS, bells, trumpet, and metallic percussion, a suite of Indian rhythms, dedicated to the three SHAKTI. Piano and woodwinds again take up the retrograded rhythmic canon of the first piece. The sequence is reversed, however, and the violins play the conclusion, or second strophe, of the melodic phrase heard in the first piece. (Olivier Messiaen)

CHAMBER SYMPHONY OP. 9 (1906) for fifteen solo instruments

The CHAMBER SYMPHONY, composed in 1906, is years ahead in concept and content. Although the romantic heritage of Brahms, Mahler and Wagner is not to be denied, one may already discern the forces which were to emerge fully in the mature Schoenberg. The form itself reveals a compactness: the different parts of a symphony in one unit, a device favored by the Vienna school, particularly by Alban Berg. The symphony corresponds to the following scheme:

I - Exposition of two themes, with a repeat of the principal theme and transitional segments between each.
II - Scherzo and trio with repeat.
III - Development (in three parts)
IV - Slow movement
V - Repeat of the thematic material of the first part in a more elaborate form, modified and in the nature of a Finale.

THREE PIECES FOR ORCHESTRA (1910) for an ensemble of instrumental soloists

The THREE PIECES were only discovered in 1957 among some papers left by the composer. Dating from 1910, a year before Schoenberg wrote the Six Little Pieces for Piano, op. 19, they reflect the composer's preoccupation with extreme economy of means and maximum concentration of form. It also illustrates the principal of non-repetition, emphasizing variability, asymmetry, and plurality, shedding new light on this aspect of Schoenberg's thought. (Jean-Claude Eloy)

Tracklisting:

Side 1 (All tracks by Olivier Messiaen)

1. Seven Haikai: I. Introduction {1:50}

2. Seven Haikai: II. The Park of Nara and the Stone Lanterns {1:30}

3. Seven Haikai: III. Yamanaka-Cadenza {3:39}

4. Seven Haikai: IV. Gagaku {2:57}

5. Seven Haikai: V. Miyajima and the Torii in the Sea {1:24}

6. Seven Haikai: VI. The Birds of Karuizawa {5:33}

7. Seven Haikai: VII. Coda {1:53}

Side 2 (All tracks by Arnold Schoenberg)

1. Chamber Symphony, Op. 9 {17:08}

2. Three Pieces for Orchestra {1:55}

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Structures for Two Pianos

Pierre Boulez - Structures for Two Pianos

Let's get this show back on the road. I meant to have a new post up on either Tuesday or Wednesday. The cord on my AC adaptor broke while I was visiting family and I used up all of the battery on my laptop which is actually my only computer. I didn't have access to my laptop for the past few days until I made it back home where I have a backup AC adaptor.

Performers: Alfons Kontarsky and Aloys Kontarsky

From the liner notes by Tom Carlson:

Dating from 1955, the Structures are revealed upon close examination as a very logical yet complex arrangement of the materials used. In selecting his material, Boulez arranges the tone row to form a quotation from Messiaen's "Mode de valeurs et d'intensites." This passage is notable for its lack of intervals below six; however, in its inversion, it contains only intervals below seven, and the interworking of the two lines against each other gives the work its initial propulsion. To some degree, the working of musical values might well have been determined by computer, but this is true only up to a point, after which the composer must select a direction for the music to take. The notes used, their duration and dynamics are the result of serial technique, plus pre-determined tables to indicate their interaction. The composer has chosen to use all transpositions of his notes in their original form, inversion, cancrizan and inverted cancrizan, each used only once. Again, these are played with or against the previously determined dynamic shadings and time values. Beginning with the Messiaen quotation, the work is essentially "creatio ex everything," considering the wide variety of technical permutation used in the constructon of the work, and the composer's selection of various treatments to which it is subjected.

Tracklisting:

Side A

1. band 1 {3:22}

2. band 2 {8:26}

3. band 3 {2:10}

Side B

1. band 1 {8:26}

2. band 2 {10:32}

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New Directions in Music 1

Pierre Boulez/Karlheinz Stockhausen - New Directions in Music 1

I didn't mean to go over two weeks without posting anything. Hopefully, I'll be able to resume regular posting. Anyway, I dug out this LP by two familar groundbreaking composers. Enjoy.


Excerpts from the liner notes written by Robert Kraft who conducted the performances on this LP:

Our perfromers were less than wildly enthusiastic about the music at first sight, and even at fifteenth sight they were inclined to invent "lazy dogmas of impossibility" (an early Alpinist quoted in Sir Gavin de Beer's The First Ascent of Mont Blanc). However, the performers now feel that these two pieces are perfectly imagined for their instruments. In fact, the instruments have been used so well and to such effect as to cause every player to regret not having more to play.

Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre for alto voice and six instruments

Performers:

Margery MacKay - alto voice
Arthur Gleghorn - flutist
Milton Thomas - violist
William Kraft - vibraphonist
Dorothy Remsen - xylorimbist
Theodore Norman - guitarist
Walt Goodwin - percussionist (playing bongos, maracas, tambourines, claves, bells, tam-tam, triangle, gong, cymbals, small cymbals)


Though Le Marteau is significant primarily for its own newness, the fact that it brings together two or three diverse strands seems to me almost as important. It is a connecting and tradition-forming work.
...

These are the major composer influences - Webern mostly, Schoenberg for Pierrot Lunaire, Stravinsky in one type of rhythm. Of some part of their music Boulez has made new and significant use. There are other influences and ingredients too, for example, Oriental and Latin American percussion instruments (gongs, maracas, bongos), jazz, the music of Messiaen and Varese.

Le Marteau represents a consolidation and simplification in Boulez's own development, too. It is his first work to have attained a wide success. (Why? Because it is less purely "abstract" than his piano pieces? Because it has a dramatic form and an exotic instrumentation? Because it is comparatively simple to hear and and to follow?)

Karlheinz Stockhausen - Zeitmasse for five woodwinds


Performers:

Arthur Gleghorn - flutist
Donald Muggeridge - oboist
Donald Leake - English-horn player
Donald Christlieb - bassoonist
William Ulyate - clarinetist


Electronic music - Stockhausen's own - is the most obvious influence on the Zeitmasse. In fact, the two kinds of composition ought to be considered side by side. The truth is, however, that I am incompetent to do so and will therefore have to stop at recommending the Zeitmasse to the listener as a piece of musical patterns and designs like any other, with tensions, speeds, progression, successive logic of ideas, form, like any other.

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: Avant "L'Artisanat furieux" {1:28}

2. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: Commentaire I de "Bourreaux de solitude" {3:38}

3. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: "L'Artisanat furieux" {2:05}

4. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: Commentaire II de "Bourreaux de solitude" {3:05}

5. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: "Bel edifice et les pressentiments" version premiere {2:48}

6. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: "Bourreaux de solitude" {4:16}

7. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: Apres "L'Artisanat furieux" {0:49}

8. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: Commentaire III de "bourreaux de solitude" {4:31}

9. Pierre Boulez - Le Marteau sans maitre: "Bel edifice et les pressentiments" double {6:28}

Side 2

1. Karlheinz Stockhausen - Zeitmasse {13:07}

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Pierre Boulez Conducts The Domaine Musical Ensemble

The Domaine Musical Ensemble - Pierre Boulez Conducts The Domaine Musical Ensemble

Excerpts from the liner notes:

Arnold Schoenberg - Verklaerte Nacht, Op. 4

Arnold Schoenberg composed the string sextet VERLAERTE NACHT in three weeks during a holiday he took in September of 1899, when he was twenty five years old. The premiere performance took place in Vienna in 1903. Together with Guerrelieder and the symphonic poem Pelleas at Melisande, Verklaerte Nacht is one of the most significant works of Schoenberg's first creative period, full of the flamboyant expressiveness traceable across the metamorphosis of his musical language and that of the Vienna School. Undeniably, there are traces here of Wagner: harmonically, we are reminded of Tristan. The specific nature of Schoenberg's chromaticism, however, unlike Wagner's is linear and transcends tonal control.
Although cast in a unified mould, Verkaerte Nacht is in five parts that follow closely the construction of the poem by Richard Dehmel, that inspired the work. On the one hand, the work is rhythmically unstable and modulates constantly when the two persons express themselves (the woman's confession, etc.). On the other hand, when presenting the idea of place (moonlit universe, gently starlit night, etc.) the tonalities become fixed and rhythms more stable.
The work is often performed in Schoenberg's own transcription for string orchestra, but the version here presented is the original one for string sextet.

Jean-Claude Eloy - Equivalences

The title "Equivalences" refers to numerous aspects of the piece and should be interpreted in the sense of an equilibrium between contrasting forces. In the simplest terms, there is the deployment of musical instruments: A triple symmetry in an arc formed by 6 percussionists, 3 groups of winds and piano-celesta with harp. On a higher plane, we may regard it as a depiction of the contrasting elements that make up the work; density: zero to maximum; registers: fixed to mobile; coordination: absolute to relative, etc. The whole form itself reflects these oppositions, this dialectic play, whence derives a contrasting sonority, an extension of the dynamic field.
Certain structures are variable from one performance to another, utilizing modifiable intensities that affect mainly the duration of the percussion instruments' resonances, to illustrate: a contrast is created between wind instruments producing long held sounds on the one hand, and on the opposite side are percussion instruments, piano, harp, etc., producing sounds of rapid growth and decay. Bit by bit, these sounds are drawn closer until they are confronted. The movement continues, until the sounds are at their initial state, but on opposite sides: the winds producing "pointed" sounds, while the percussion instruments, by means of complicated trills, etc., produce long held sounds. Henri Pousseur describes this development as an "arc of duration".
Equivalences had its premiere performance at the Darmstadt Festival in July 1963 under the direction of Pierre Boulez.

Henri Pousseur - Madrigal III

HENRI POUSSEUR was born at Malmedy, Belgium in 1929. He studied at the Liege and Bruxelles Conservatoires from 1947 to 1953. From 1954 to 1957 he worked at the electronic music studios of Radio Cologne and Milano. He is co-founder and, since 1958, director of the APELAC studio in Bruxelles. He has authored important theoretical works on contemporary music, and has given lecture cycles at Darmstadt and other centres.
Madrigal III for clarinet, violin, cello, 2 percussion instruments and piano was composed in the spring of 1962 and dedicated to the memory of Wolfgang Steinecke, since 1945 the daring promoter of the Darmstadt Festival.
This work comprises almost all of Madrigal I, written four years earlier for clarinet solo. For Pousseur, the earlier work represented a first and almost unconscious attempt to reactivate the harmonic values that post-Webernian music had almost neutralized. Pousseur made a more resolute attempt in this direction in Votre Faust. In Madrigal III, this reactivation is still dependent on dodecaphonic material, and crystalizes around a process of frequent and variable repetition of the constituent notes of an harmonic "field".

Tracklisting:

SIDE 1

1. Arnold Schoenberg - Verklaerte Nacht, Op. 4 {28:27}

SIDE 2

1. Jean-Claude Eloy - Equivalences {8:28}

2. Henri Pousseur - Madrigal III {12:00}

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