GRM Archives Box

[Nick M]

Folks: I know a lot of people here picked up a copy of this fantastic 5-CD box. I just received mine the other day and am slowly working my way through it. There is so much amazing music here, and so much to discuss, that I don't know where to start, except to say that I for one am up for discussing e.g. individual tracks- provided other people are sufficiently enthused/sad/obsessive about this music to get into it in this kind of detail. So- are people sufficiently enthused/sad/obsessive?

[Michael Eisenberg]

Ummmmmmmmm...that would be a BIG YES for me!!!

this is what I posted to the Faust list about a month ago:


I got though it all last week (and if that sounds like it was a chore..it wasnt at all)...

Loved just about all of it with many pieces being just downright stupendous.

Ones that come to mind:

Disc one-Iannis Xenakis-Concret PH A short (under 3 min) crystal tapestry of (apparently) fire and ashes crackling...mesmorizing

Disc two-well...most of it was just stunning. What can I say. A couple that stand out are Beatriz Ferreyra "Mer d'Azov and the two pieces by Alain Savouret. I'm wondering if anyone here knows more about these two composers, because their representations on this set makes me want to go out and acquire everything they have ever done (I'm weird like that)

Disc three-Again...all of it was fantastic. Standouts were the Francis Dhomont piece called "Novars" (no surprise there...most everything I've heard from Dhomont is top notch) and the Jean-Claude Risset contribution called "Sud". The latter being a particulary mind blowing demonstration of what I would imagine good industrial music to be. (I know next to nothing about industrial music)

Disc four-once again...superb!! This collection had more "natural" recognizable instruments added to the acousmatic sounds...so the feel of this disc was totally different than the three before it. Much more organic sounding rather than the alien operating room antics that were happening before. Not to say that those still werent there, they were, but with the addition of some stringed insturments (violin, contrebasse) I was brought down to earth for a short while. Standouts were the Denis Dufour piece and the Ramon Gonzales-Arroyo piece.

Disc five-back to the deep reaches of space. The two Jean Schwarz pieces are great along with a rather humourous Francois Bayle/Robert Wyatt collaboration. There is also one by Bernard Parmegiani called "La roue Ferris" that could be my favorite 10 minutes of the whole box. If you're a Tangerine Dream fan...this one is for you! Constantly morphing layers upon layers of sequenced bliss that I just did not want to end. (Speaking of Parmegiani...anyone familiar with his "La Creation du Monde" disc? This is one of my favorite acousmatic discs so far. It was done between 1982-84 but sounds like it came from the year 2207. It projects a movie for the ears about the creation of the universe...and you ARE there...no kidding)

...also there is a 100 page booklet of black and white photographs of all the composers in their various workshops at the GRM as well as in performance. Being a photog myself, I especially enjoyed these.

So, babbling aside (to late you might think :) ) this box, for me might be the purchase of the year and will go a long way in aiding me for future explorations.

[Nick M]

OK, good- I thought you'd be up for it, Michael.

"Concret pH" is one of the very few pieces on that box-set I'd already heard- it's on an excellent comp called "Early Modulations: Vintage Volts" that would probably interest you:

http://www.discogs.com/release/67418

Anyway- I'm going to pick one track you mention and get back to you on it in the next day or two. Watch this space.

[Nick M]

OK, as promised.

For no particular reason, I homed in on Beatriz Ferreyra, "Mer d'Azov" : First thing to say is that Beatriz Ferreyra is one of quite a few composers featured on these discs that I'd never heard of before. Seems she was a classically trained pianist who studied composition with Schaeffer and Ligeti and was part of the GRM group for much of the 60s. This piece, from 1963, was her first electro-acoustic work, which is in itself remarkable.

I like the piece very much, I agree it's a standout. What I find particularly interesting about it is the way that it seems to combine a sense of expansiveness- drone or drift, or "continuous sonority" as the liner notes have it, with other passages where there are a series of different sounds in quick succession without obvious continuity between them, demanding a rather different kind of listening (I'm becoming increasingly intrigued by this- the way that different musics make different demands on the listener with regard to attention and time perception, but maybe that's a topic for another post). Luc Ferrari's "Etude aux sons tendus", on the same disc, is a particularly extreme example of this latter approach: sounds as brief gestures, each one self-contained, although the Beatriz Ferreyra piece does seem to have more of a sense of flow, or at least more sense of an overall guiding aesthetic. The sheets of sound that comprise the dronier part of the piece have a dense, murky quality- I don't know to what extent this reflects the equipment available at the time but it's very effective, I was put in mind of a hot, hazy swamp, with flies hanging and buzzing in steamy, stagnant air. The power of these very abstracted sounds to evoke all sorts of sense impressions is one of the most fascinating things about this music generally, I find.

The piece is only 4 minutes long, and so much happens in those 4 minutes- in fact the brevity of many of these pieces perhaps stands as a rebuke to the self-indulgence of many contemporary experimental electronica artists, though there's definitely a place for very lengthy works in this style. On which note- Michael, if you like this Ferreyra piece, then I feel fairly safe in predicting you'll like that Hafler Trio album- the style really isn't so very far away.

Thoughts/comments welcome.

[Michael Eisenberg]

Nick, Andy and anyone else who happens upon this...

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to your comments about Ms Ferreyra...it wasnt till a few days ago that I was able to revisit this short little piece that we are talking about and I didnt want to write anything about it until I heard it at least one more time.

Nick, your comments about how, in the space of three minutes and change there is a myriad of musical ideas happening are one of the reasons I listen to this music. On the surface, and if you are just listening casually to this piece (and many other acousmatic pieces for that matter) tiny little details and ear candy snippets might just fly by without any notice. To me, this music absolutely demands some degree of active listening...whether that means though a good sound system or headphones, in a dark room or other conducive environments or even in the right mind state (whatever that means...open to interpretation)...I believe active, attentative listening is mandatory. Anything less defeats the purpose...so, if you want to just bliss out...listen to Eno's ambient works or something from Steve Roach. But, if you prefer to see the next acadamy award mind movie directed by (insert your name here)...then go the acousmatic route.

The Ferreyra piece conjured up several things in the recesses of my brain. The drone like passage was really murky...like walking though an impenetrably thick and artificial fog or being mired in some ugly, gritty plastic-like substance. When the drone is broken, so is the image...and the short little sound events that happen afterwards, formed a whole image of some kitchy 1950's type mad scientist's laboratory with some wired hair madman twiddling all kinds of knobs and dials.

I completely agree with your thoughts about how the sense of flow was maintained between the drone and the more jarring bursts of sound that happen later. The whole piece has a seamless flow and nothing seemed out of place. Every sound event happened quite naturally, as if it SHOULD be there, and anything else would have been the wrong choice. For me, this is what the true genius of the piece is...the ability to keep an even flow, even though the whole intrinsic "sound" of the piece is changed from the start to the finish. The fact that this is done without me, the listener noticing,or even batting an eyebrow constitututes true talent..

Also, thanks for that info about Ferreyra...it made for some interesting reading and also serves as a good introductory text for people just discovering acousmatic music. This music, as well as Dumitrescu/Avram's I really believe to be the new truly progressive art in termes of discovering brave new worlds.


best
Michael

[Andy Wilson]

just to say that although i haven't yet contributed, i'm enjoying the discussion immensely and hope to get the time to catch up and offer some of my own thoughts and reviews.

I'd never heard of Beatriz Ferreyra before I got the box, and haven't even played that track yet (catching up on loads of records at the moment.)

Apart from trying to sort out the ning! pages I spent today doing a final master of the sunseastar album - I'm really looking forward to hearing what you two think of it when it's finally released.

[Nick M]

Well, I've been immersing myself in disc 4... Andy, you should take a listen to Horacio Vaggione's piece "Ash"- it's in a similar space to some Sunseastar I reckon- I'd be interested to know what you make of it.

Other outstanding tracks on this disc are:

'Exercisme 3'- Bernard Parmegiani- one of my favourite pieces across the whole box. Sounds like a swarm of gnats sprayed shiny silver. Actually reminds me of music I heard in Morocco where the massed zurnas set the air buzzing as if some insect demon were being summoned.

http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/Exhibitions/Instruments/Anglais/cmam_j_...

And, as Michael said:

Ramon Gonzales-Arroyo- 'De la distance'- my immediate reaction was to think "sounds like Dumitrescu!", which isn't something you can say very often.

[Michael Eisenberg]

Ramon Gonzales-Arroyo- 'De la distance'- my immediate reaction was to think "sounds like Dumitrescu!", which isn't something you can say very often.

Since you brought it up Nick...I listened to it again last night. I really love the way he mixes the musique concrete component with the real (chamber?) orchestra., although, to be honest I don't hear the Dumitrescu. This piece seems to have much more of a refined, smooth-edged feel to it than anything ID ever did.

While Dumitrescu's work, in general, seems very spikey, grainy and primitively ugly (in a beautiful way)...the Gonzales-Arroyo piece sounds like all the rough edges have been smoothed over and whats left is a very interesting and engaging hybrid of acousmatic and contemporary classical thats over much to soon. I would love to hear a whole album of this!

But now that I think back...there was one point where the processing breaks up one of the stringed instruments into a multitude of tiny, crystalline sound fragments that sound like bits of broken glass showering down...thats very Dumitrescu like...and I'm wondering if that's what you heard.

Anyway...a fantastic piece, as is most everything else in this box set! I'm going to try and get to the Parmegiani piece tonite.

best
Michael

[Nick M]

Michael- those are fair comments- I think it was probably just the way that a double bass is used to generate sounds one wouldn't normally associate with the instrument- reminded me of a Dumitrescu piece which is essentially a double bass solo, although I'd never have known that if the sleeve hadn't said so. The overall sound is probably not that Dumitrescu-like, though.

[Andy Wilson]

I finally got around to listening to 'De la distance' properly. I thought that the technique was similar to that of Dumitrescus numebrous bass soloists, though a bit more nervy. The big difference to me was that it seemed to have much more conventional mic'ing - you didn't get the same sense of getting inside the sound, close to it's raw physicality. But it's a fine track, of course. There is so much on this box... magnificent.
I'm sure that I must have mentioned elsewhere that I finally found a copy of Grillo's recording, 'Fluvine', which is one of the best bass solo pieces I've heard. Very highly recommended to everyone following this thead.

[Andy Wilson]

Talking of which, completely by coincidence I just saw a copy of this (very hard to get) CD, Fluvine, on sale on ebay ($40): http://tinyurl.com/2squd8