creation : 16 January 1992, Théâtre de la Criée, Marseille (France)
dedicated to Percussions de Strasbourg
There is indeed the Song of the Earth by Gustav Malher. But can this Earth still sing today? Shouldn’t it be appropriate to sing for it, to evoke its beauty at the very moment when it is threatened?
If it is appropriate to speak of man’s dramas, torments and death, it is obvious to express the same feelings for this Earth that gives us life.
In romantic expression, she was the generous inspirer, the inexhaustible source of all man’s happiness. Today, we exhaust it until death.
- Lost Waves: The Aral Sea
- UIRAPURU: Amazonia
- IMPALA: The African savannah
- OLD FAITHFUL: Yellowstone Frozen Bison
- SIAL,SIMA, NIFE: The magmas
- CONFLICTIONS: The Mediterranean forest
Lost waves :
I evoke the Aral Sea which is drying out and has lost 70% of its volume of water. The vision of a puddle instead of a sea: not enough water to make waves.
Uirapuru :
The Uirapuru is this bird, an extraordinary singer, which can be heard in the endangered Amazon rainforest.
Marimba song accompanied by Maracas, Claves, Guiros, Wood-Block… etc. François Bayle had already used a song by Uirapuru in “Three Bird Dreams”.
Impala :
Evocation of the fast animals which are the Gazelles, the Antelopes which belong to the “Cavicornes” family. I see these animals on the African Plateau of the Seringuetti whose speed is the means of survival; in participation, in particular, the “added values” evoke their ability to change direction instantaneously.
Old faithful :
Yellowstone Park, with its vivid and colourful spring, and its icy, motionless winter. During the winter, the heavy Bison, almost frozen in the square, covered with snow and ice and, paradoxically, the hot water geysers. One of them: the “Old faithful”.
Here, a “Chant de timbales” (and not a solo with all the virtuosity that this entails) accompanied by the quivering of studded cymbals, marimba, and light melodies of “covered” Toms. All this is at the limit of the audible, without dynamics, to evoke heaviness and sadness.
Sial, Sima, Nife :
At the beginning of the score is written: “Innig” (Innerness – as Brahms did in his last works for piano).
Here, the same idea of penetration into the interior of man (in the realm of thought) and into the interior of the Earth. A sound path that goes from the boxes with “timbre” to the deep rolls of the Grosses – Caisses and Timpani.
Conflagration :
Forest fires. Violence. Destruction. A polyrhythm based on the pulse of the cicadas? Bright light. Essentially the keyboards (Glockenspiel, Xylophone, Vibraphone, Marimba) punctuated with Cymbals, Thai Gongs, Cencrros … etc.
Georges BOEUF