Manifesto
Franck BEDROSSIAN (b.1971)
It, for seven instruments (2004-07) [14:58]
La Solitude du Coureur de Fond, for alto saxophone (2000/2008) [6:12]
Tracés d'Ombres, for string quartet (2005-07) [10:55]
Manifesto, for eight wind instruments (2008) [6:48]
Bossa Nova, for accordion (2008) [7:32]
Propaganda, for saxophone quartet and electronics (2008) [8:00]
Pierre-Stéphane Meugé (saxophone)
Pascal Contet (accordion)
Habanera Quartet
Ensemble 2e2m/Pierre Roullier
rec. Conservatoire de Gennevilliers, Paris, 22-25 May 2009, 17 January 2010.
DDD
AEON AECD1106 [54:26]
The digipak-style case of this new release by French label Aeon has a slightly
pretentious look about it, and the French-origin liner notes only underline
the impression with typical IRCAMese language that sees sounds only from the
viewpoint of the sonics-cum-social scientist in a lab coat with a casual grasp
of grammar. Thus: "Together with this reflection on spectral thought,
Franck Bedrossian also carries out a critique of the dominant discourse of
the 1990s, [...] Saturated music refuses to confine itself in the Lachenmannian
dilemma bringing proletarian 'bruité sound' into conflict with the
more philistine 'philharmonic sounds'. It sets complex sounds as the paradigm
of a new music, having integrated Varèse's 'sound-energy' as well as free
jazz's 'sound-gestures'. It is by this standard that most of the works in
this monograph must be listened to."
That last edict can be safely ignored, but French composer Franck Bedrossian,
though currently teaching at Berkeley University in California, is a son of
IRCAM and his music reflects as much. These six variously scored works, all
from 2007 or 2008, are more about sounds than music, and the sounds are often
bizarre: in Bossa Nova and La Solitude du Coureur de Fond, for
example, it is hard to believe at times that the instrument heard is the one
indicated or that there is only one instrument. There are frequent flirtations
with free jazz in La Solitude, Propaganda and It, but that in
itself is no indication of approachability - in Bedrossian's conception, far
from it. Tunes are in short supply in his music, to put it mildly, as are
recognisable rhythms - only a peg-legged, demoniac girl from Ipanema could
dance to Bedrossian's Bossa Nova! At the same time, the long, exploratory
sections of multiphonics, Larsen effects and sonic saturation, as the notes
would put it, also yield occasional passages of more orthodox sounds loosely
bundled into relatively accessible material.
Nevertheless, most items, such as the extraordinary Tracés d'Ombres
and La Solitude du Coureur de Fond, should not be tackled by any but
the doughtiest. Tracés d'Ombres is Bedrossian's first string quartet,
but it is such a concentrated, jaw-dropping barrage of effects - very reminiscent
of Xenakis, especially his Ergma quartet - that he may already have
said with it all that he can with such forces.
There is no aural respite in the title track Manifesto, a Varèsian
noir work for eight wind instruments, yet so far outside the tradition of
wind writing that it sounds like music from an alien world. Nor in It,
perhaps Bedrossian's most performed work, and a thrilling manifesto for the
avant garde, which, on this evidence, has not only not mellowed with age,
but actually stepped up its disquisitions into the outer limits of the various
components of music. The success or failure of these expeditions does not
depend on general audience approval, which is a good job, because that will
never happen. But composers like Bedrossian have every right and every artistic
justification to continue writing this kind of music. With luck, enough audacious
listeners will try out and perhaps even enjoy this and similar CDs (there
are more to come from Aeon shortly) to allow the avant garde - a quaint term
now, perhaps, but still apt - to continue at least to exist.
Bedrossian's music demands superhuman feats of concentration and application
of the various soloists, mainly drawn from and supported by the remarkable
Ensemble 2e2m, and performances are outstanding - or at least as far as can
be told! Sound quality too is excellent. The CD booklet, actually neat and
tidy inside, provides comments on the works by Bedrossian himself - these
are far better than Omer Corlaix's general notes, adhering as they do to facts
expressed in clear language.
Byzantion
Collected reviews and contact at reviews.gramma.co.uk
Bedrossian is a son of IRCAM and his music reflects as much.