This article was downloaded by: [Ingenta Content Distribution - Routledge] On: 30 September 2008 Access details: Access Details: [subscription number 791963552] Publisher Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Contemporary Music Review Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713455393 Gérard Grisey and the foliation of time P. A. Castanet; Joshua Fineberg Online Publication Date: 01 January 2000 To cite this Article Castanet, P. A. and Fineberg, Joshua(2000)'Gérard Grisey and the foliation of time',Contemporary Music Review,19:3,29 — 40 To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1080/07494460000640351 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07494460000640351 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material. a member of the Taylor & Francis Group. Vol.V.. A shared sensibility In the 20th century numerous composers have made use of nature in its raw form.the organic. Castanet Translated by Joshua Fineberg KEY WORDS: G6rard Grisey. Water. Kagel . along with various other naturally produced phenomena have been recorded or created in concert. spectral music. as musical material. p. Murail. fire. a universe which steadfastly prefers sterility and acceptance to the smoldering isolation of a more personal route. Thus. A.. However. with a hunger for technological progress and with consideration for the cultural as well as physical aspects of sound. possessing a vast amount of technique and profound instinct for realizing musical works. Published by license under the Harwood Academic Publishers imprint. offering composers (such as Mache. musical time. Itin6raire. acoustic nature of sound . 29-40 Photocopying permitted by license only 9 2000 OPA (Overseas Publishers Association) N. determined and unique. among the creators of the post-war generation. wind. at the center of the laboratory of European musical science. part of Gordon and Breach Publishing.) a collection of instruments rich in parametric possibilities. G6rard Grisey has remained a true composer. G4rard Grisey and the Foliation of Time P. Dufourt. G6rard Grisey (born in 1946) has been composing in solitude for more than twenty-five years.strongly influenced a few research-minded musicians. Levinas. who would 29 . In the midst of the grayish panorama of contemporary music. 19.. Tessier. Part 3. in the early seventies a different aspect of nature . process.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 Contemporary Music Review 2000. Messiaen..Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . Xenakis. Grisey. Immersed in science and philosophy. living. both harmonic and (youth and creative greed oblige) inharmonic. Rebonds (1993)..Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution .' In the middle of this group of experimenters. Var6se.. extolling the virtues of the 'ecology' of musical source material. Grisey would work diligently on the 'evolution of sound 1' focusing aesthetically on both musical and temporal issues. "Spectral Music". Sonic archeology. for a musical 'language' and 'syntagm' based on a profound use of sonic phenomena in all their complexity. Diaclase (1993). Hindemith. the diphonic vocal techniques of Mongolian H66mi singers or the techniques of the peasants of Touva. the 'spectral' composers began hawking a n e w idea and formed a new 'school. Vivier. confronted with the hippie-like happenings that grew out of the culture inspired by the student uprisings in Paris in May 1968. Castanet guide the development of the ensemble l'Itin6raire in Paris."this implies the sonic evolution as projectedinto the work's future: the sound's becomingwhat it will become. Following a long line of eminent scientists. With the approval of Olivier Messiaen. . a spirit of modified micro-spectrality is felt in certain recent works of Levinas: for example.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 30 P. translator's note: the expressionused in French is 'devenir du sonore. going from Galileo or Descartes to Newton or Saveur and touching upon the 'concomitant sounds' of Father Marin Mersenne. and in opposition to Pierre Boulez's Domaine Musical and its image of compositional technique within a vacuum. Per Norgaard . the route towards.A. began. each in their own way. In the wake of this cosmopolitan movement. ). Par-Del~ (1994) and the work 1. Although a bit late. the stories and legends of China. a group of Parisian composers and instrumentalists founded the ensemble l'Itin6raire in 1973. what Hugues Dufourt called in his now historical article. Those most concerned with the overall relationships of phenomenological sonic material (of this group of composers. musical mythology Without going back to mythological references such as the Gandharva. consideration of natural acoustic phenomena highlighting a fundamental note and its colored train of upper partials has effected m a n y postromantic musicians (from Debussy. to a lesser degree. Scelsi and Messiaen to Radulescu. this group's first efforts cried out for listening to the sounds themselves. only Dufourt was not Messiaen's student) are clearly G6rard Grisey and Tristan Murail along with Michael Levinas. Scriabin. Jolivet. .Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 Girard Grisey and the Foliation of Time 31 which synthesizes much of the research in the other pieces.1410-1497) and to the games of Pygmies from the Lituri region. where at each instant the material seems to be hoarding to itself the fragile allegory of self-genesis. Hugues Dufourt must be considered a sort of 'faux-spectral' composer. As for Roger Tessier.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . Grisey was able to realize a continuous voice and two streams of extraordinary respiratory pulsations.' Moreover. the opera GO-gol (1994).. The general concepts of perturbation and erosion. Modulations (1976-1977).1400-1474 . "In turn divine.. Extracted from the mega-cycle Les Espaces Acoustiques (1975-1985). seductive. it also owes a debt to the rigorous structures used by the polyphonic music of the fifteenth century (mainly Guillaume Dufay .. while the success of this piece owes much to cutting edge technology." this instrumental source "copies and multiplies itself into a crowd" explains . An analytical use of sonograms of brass instruments along with spectrograms of the transformations caused by adding various mutes. both a mirror and a projection of all the fantasies of the h u m a n voice. for example.and Johannes Ockeghem . Coalescence for clarinet and two orchestras . The machine voice can assume the roles of both Beauty and the Beast.2 Hertz). However. In as much as his music makes no use of micro-intervals and in opposition to the generally held view. the form itself recounts 'the history of the sounds of which it is made. shows acoustic zones in perpetual motion around a fundamental E (41. for mixed voices and computer synthesized voice.. facilitate its controlled distortion. performing a similar role to the Tampura of Indian music. In this piece. created at IRCAM (Paris) by Xavier Rodet and Yves Potard.to synthesize more richly the spectrum of a single note played on the trombone using sixteen instruments for the task. threatening. Additionally. only occasionally using the solipsistic concept of a single sound as the basis for a piece (Clair-Obscur for soprano. on the contrary. in the same instrumental cycle. The artifice of nature The works of Grisey from 1970-1980 contain at once self-generative phenomena and self-destructive ingredients. allow the synthetic reconstruction of the globality of the timbre or.1977. he only dealt obliquely with the techniques offered by spectral music. instrumental trio and electroacoustic treatments ... Using the program Chant. the synthetic voice functions as a referential model for the live singers. monstrous. are the purview not only of Partiels but also of Chants de l'Amour (1981-1984). the composers attempts .with Partiels (1975) . read entropy.1987). Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 32 P.o . A. Castanet N. 0 o ~ m o= ~o .Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution .. look at the middle section in which a system of alternating echoes between the human and robot voices is established (see Figure 1). of conflict and phagocytosis b u t also the false autonomy of many types of dialogue (of belligerents. the breath .Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 G~rard Grisey and the Foliation of Time 33 the composer (listen to the duo titled 'I love you' which unleashes a sonic vision worthy of Dante's hell: a crowd of lovers is depicted b y thousand of voices which call out to each other.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . then finally to speak twenty-two different languages.. and happily. the archetypal times of nature move freely between the movements of V o r t e x T e m p o r u m (1994-1995) "in constant times as different as those of humans (the time of language and the time of respiration). Two more examples: first. Grisey's imprint never breaks the thread of his continuous preoccupation with temporal metamorphoses. swirling around then collapsing). to breathe. Staged in the theater of life. "that voice risks being more human then a natural voice. both more pure and more painful. In fact G6rard Grisey.learns to live. He uses. Charles Ives said of nature that "she likes analogies but she hates repetition.think of A n t i p h y s i s . "Supreme seduction.. to this end. dreaming in the snore of the electronic monster." If Dufourt strangles the beautiful nature of the encyclopedists (and the pastoral flute .1978) and if Murail plays at warping mechanical systems (reread the pretext for the ground rules of Mdvnoire l~rosion ." explains the composer. to move. likes the truth of nature. to sing. fine distortions and precise blurs. a curious and intelligent aesthete. then consider the touching scene where the chorus sings a last lullaby then drifts off into sleep. of friends. become very artistically vague. that of whales (the spectral time of sleep rhythms) and that of birds or insects (extremely contracted time where the borders become blurred).. Furthermore.1976). to stammer. Going from a system of timbro-temporal deformation to a controlled spatio-harmonic dilation. of tender confidence)..." As can be seen. Delicate violence and real~false nature In the same w a y that the scenes of slight 'catastrophes' suspended by the mathematician Ren6 Thorn or in the same tendency manifested in the pictures showing the imprecise crossing of the border from indigo to violet in the experiments of N e w t o n on the dispersion of light." Grisey told us. Freely personified. the spatiosonic relations of the man-chorist with the machine-singer is made up of both fusion and interaction. the true division between natural and unnatural has clearly. Grisey has subtly harmonized the laws of a curiosity inspired craftsmanship.dare we call it the anima? . some . and outside of the analysis of the classic parameters. an informed listener could concentrate on the following dichotomies (see the table below): dynamic p o l e durations phasing time ppp FFF strict notation repetition ad-lib. now nocturnal. written for six percussionists placed around the audience.toile (1989-1990). periodic aperiodic striated non-pulsated kinetic. Jour. in extremely special halftone colors. Castanet pages from Grisey's work discreetly reveal the indescribable paradox or the impossible dialectic. spatio-temporal activity rhythm agogic passive (fermata) sometimes free active sometimes free poly-tempi release tension sonic genesis aesthetic biomorph (natural model) technomorph (electronic model) organic nature artificial noise . A.' As in Partiels. exposing impressions of a jumble. Le Noir de I ~. For those wanting to study more closely Grisey's continuous transitions. The troubling effect of the re-transmitted periodico-astronomic sounds of this neutron star comes in part from the fact that the sounds are the result of the audible transcoding of the electromagnetic waves that make up a portion of the star's 'light" and also because the sounds that have finally become audible have taken at least fifteen thousand years to reach us. his parametric dovetailing or his aesthetic mediations. now diurnal.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . as sweeping movements from shadow to clarity.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 34 P. Concerning Partiels. Contre-jour (1978-1979) is an exact image of a quasi-virtual passage of the progression 'from daily time to musical time. the imagination perceives the timbral lighting. integrates into the sonic discourse a music created by the speed of rotation of two pulsars (the residue of a Super Nova): one called V61a (in French) was prerecorded and the other is captured 'live" by radio telescope. an in depth study of Partiels or Talea might prove useful. . leaves the pianist with the feeling of being free. but under surveillance as regards the means of circumscribing the metronomic stability: "to give the impression of hesitation to the tempo (accelerando or rallantando)" .each instrument deploying its own network of harmonics dramaturgy process dynamic and timbric visual and scenic purification contamination by parasite More recently.. two synthesizers and chamber orchestra contains pairs of instruments rigorously written in 'false-unisons' or 'false-octaves.) tutti . the poly-metric ritual of Tempus ex machina (1979) for six percussionists must be considered as well as the spatial disposition and accumulating stratification of temporalities of L'Ic6ne Paradoxale (homage to Piero della Francesca .. along with the dedication to Salvatore Sciarrino.' Similarly.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . "to create a blurred periodicity using slight fluctuations around a constant. The Egyptian symbolic codification inspired b y The Book of the Dead was used in Anubis-Nout (1983-1988) and a desire to bring out the 'myth of .Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 GErard Grisey and the Foliation of Time 35 pitch sound timbre relation material spectral cluster sinusoidal noisy pure dirty consonant dissonant homogeneous heterogeneous character luminosity density smooth material clear grainy material dark single sound/two part spectral band ( 2 ft. Le Temps et l'~cume (1988-1989) for four percussionists.1993-1994 for two w o m e n ' s voices and large orchestra divided into two groups). Mnemosyneexposed G6rard Grisey looks for inspiration in the richness of extra-European art and philosophy: in this regard." writes Grisey on the conductor's score.. Vortex Temporum II (1994-1995) for sextet. the orchestra is spatialized as two times two ensembles: the large orchestra is divided into low instruments and high ones and a small phalanx is split into two symmetrical groups which envelope the two female voices. the presence of zones of coherence can be seen . the first piece of the Espaces Acoustiques. A. ambivalence and consonance in L'Ic6ne Paradoxale (1993-1994). with its almost didactic connotations. The motion of the represented space is built upon two simultaneous processes. a rhythmic inscription. for example.. is manifested in Talea (1986). While the form of the work 'traces two contrary evolutions. Explicit references are given by Grisey in the title. the bi-tempic use of the contrabass tom and very low bass d r u m extracted from St~le. in which can be observed the independence of structural models. The first rule governs the superposition of the different tempi (quarter note = 40 for the tom. La Madonna del Parto. To illustrate this. Grisey is no stranger to the secular archetypes of occidental music. quarter note = 45 or slower for the bass drum)." See.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 36 P. analogous to two diagonals whose intersection . the application 'in situ' of the medieval idea of the talea influencing the disassociation of rhythms and pitches.. either. St~le . a cellular game of variable durations with stopping points for the bass drum).within the complex stratagraphy that sculpts the interior of Vortex Temporum (1994-1995).Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . In that recent work. the second controls the evolution towards disappearance of the rhythmic cells that nourish it (longer and longer rhythmic values for the tom. Remember that Michael Levinas wrote something along the same order with Arsis and Thdsis in 1971.. Looking through this prism. first indiscernible then finally in an archaic hammering? While composing. in Figure 2. We can finally judge the lyrical interplay of duplication. through the distribution of the orchestral ensembles and also through the structure of the piece. Castanet duration' is present in Vortex Temporum III and in St~le (1995).. Additionally. the color. an image came to me: that of archeologists discovering a stele and cleaning its surface until its funeral inscription becomes visible. take Modulations (1976-1977). A close relation is created to the visual logic of Piero della Francesca's famous painting. spectral ambiguity. above all else. We should also try to understand the Griseyist idea of (re)considering the aura of sympathetic resonance that is wrapped around the ancient notion of m o n o d y in Prologue (1976).duo for percussion dedicated to Dominique Troncin .bears a heading with the following symptomatic phrases: "How can a cellular organization be made to emerge from a flow which obeys other laws? How can you sketch with precision and at the edge of silence.close in some ways to the ancestral apparatus of occidental tonality . All of these examples serve as so m a n y cultural clues to a need which is musical. A canon of neumes crystallizes in a polyphony of blocks. ml E - ~ .Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution ...Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 G~rard Grisey and the Foliation of Time 37 i .4 8 O m e~ 87 i Illl ~ I..0 I l LD ! . as always in Grisey's music. where only a vague distribution of colors and forms can be distinguished. determines the presence of the different harmonic fields. a continuous and periodic rotation invades the entire available sonic space. sustained notes standing against the rhythms. G6rard Grisey concludes the prefatory notes to L'Ic3ne Paradoxale in this way: "When Time II and Tn-ne III cross at the intersection of the diagonals.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . the soprano and mezzo-soprano perform a slow evolution. "like the view of a painting from very far away.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 38 P. In opposition to the timbral principals of Time I. for example.' The composer explains that in this way the Time I is 'extremely compressed. but dilated. Castanet makes up the middle section.' High pitched instruments of the large orchestra play a compressed version of the entire piece in 16 seconds.' With the accompaniment of the small orchestra." This reduction in format is perceived through fragmentary progressions and repetitions. Analyze. the cleavage of the structural layout for La Barque Mystique for quintet (1993) or the rhythmic . the use of the principal of fractals in Serendib for 22 instruments (1991-1992) the creation of a paradoxical flow (impact of the micro-logic and a sudden bifurcation of the macro-formal structure) in La Dynamique des Fluides for orchestra (1992). Time III is somewhat related to the linguistic content of Time 1I. If musical content seems to have calmed a bit." The score ends with a three part temporal foliation (an accumulation of times I.. starting from vowels and moving toward consonants.. "Time IV is extremely dilated.foliated into different levels as in Vortex Temporum . A. II and IV) followed by a short coda recapitulating all the spectral material. Here. while still continuing its evolution within the directional time of spectral music.uses here 'the proportions which underlie the composition of the fresco: 3-5-8-12.' the temporal material . from color to attain noise-like sounds." The entire large orchestra presents a slow spectral punctuation which. it is the low instruments of the large instrumental group that "articulates in slowmotion the 'noise' of consonants contained in the different signatures of Piero della Francesca (in Latin and Italian). The measured passage of the century and history The recent pieces of Tristan Murail avoid a priori processes that are too clearly predictable from the outside." Diametrically opposed to the radicality of Time I. Time II tries to be 'linguistic. from the beginning to the end of the piece. form seems to have become truly more complex. with neither eclecticism nor technical obsession. he has stopped believing in an infinitely rosy future and that the notion of "enlarging the field of consciousness in concentric circles" seems to have become preferable. to that of progress. cry out for vain repetition. modernism vs. If serious listening to Le Temps et l'~cume by Grisey evokes a certain heritage from Debussy. At the recent premiere of L'Espace aux Ombres (1994-1995). On the contrary. Levinas seems to have kept some distance from the ardent flames of technology to embrace the acoustic body in its brute form. like many people today. Look at the extreme auto development in the progression of the Philosophe selon Rembrandt for orchestra (1987-1992). In the same way as for a pagan ritual.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . Thus history has never stopped following its long. Today. Moreover. free from the artifice of Magical Electricity. today. scrutinizing certain pages of Jour. however. Grisey tends to denounce the plethora of orgiastic sounds and the almost unlimited breadth of scale systems which. according to him." "The relation to past attachments does not.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 G~rard Grisey and the Foliation of Time 39 vortexes (organized by the idea of a spiral centered on multiple ostinati) in La Mandragore for piano (1993). chaotic but uninterrupted. it has become essential to re-evaluate the craft of musical composition. Contre-jour. the composed evoked the quarrel which has framed the last ten years. the basic question presented by the author of L'Heure des Traces was phrased in the following way: "How can we renew our relationship with tradition without giving these renovations a traditional form?" G6rard Grisey solemnly swore to us that. he tries to suppress all external references and all articulations which are too connotated. Scelsi and . rocket ride of referential or even irreverent events. to pick back up the thread of history. transgressing the strictures of traditionally assignable forms. Following Dufourt's example." One of the real problems facing current musical creation is "that of re-using tradition." Infine. In this way. this conflict can doubtlessly find a "constructive solution. will not necessarily produce viable long-term solutions." leading to a "synthesis of styles" and giving birth to "an original from of art. or the intelligent manipulations of parametric perspective in The Watery Star for octet (1993) erasing at once harmony. while Dufourt thinks that 'the orchestra is still the best synthesizer we have. inevitably calls to mind a certain kinship to Ligeti. timbre and pulse to create the inextricabilis of instrumental fusion. Hugues Dufourt works with a new typology of duration. post-modernism. According to Dufourt. camped at the end of a boundary line linking the three 'ees' (Debussy. leaving the circular matrix that encloses the ideas of Messiaen and Stockhausen.' Grisey is moving slowly away from the sphere of art-science in which he had total confidence in earlier decades (1970s-1980s). . At the d a w n of the XXIst century and in our specialty.Routledge] At: 08:34 30 September 2008 40 P. Listen then meditate. during World War II. other unexpected influences have marked the pieces with a more recent spectral essence: from the rhythmic sedimentation.Downloaded By: [Ingenta Content Distribution . that the truly great history was the history of inventions. Grisey searches. "You have to open up in order to live better within the enclosed garden of sonic images. "It is they which provoke history. might we not add to this perspective credo the adjective 'musicological'? . to the original concept of vertiginous repetition. A... or the swirling treatment of distinctive material in the manner of a Ravel quotation for Vortex Temporum L K III '. to be continued. dear to Morton Feldman.' Raymond Queneau wrote. lives and opens.. biological and geographic data" . evolves. that comes from extra-European musical practices. passing through the incisive rapidity of short objects in the manner of Janacek. listens. In this way. Castanet Ligeti). based on statistical." advises the composer of Chants de l'Amour in an article printed in the Cahiers du Renard. then listen again.