creation : Strasbourg, 9 décembre 1988, pedagogical version with the participation of the C.F.M.I. and the French Ministry of Education.
commission : Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication, 1985
musicians: 6 percussionists and child
duration : approx. 25′
dedicated to : Percussions de Strasbourg
This piece was written for Les Percussions de Strasbourg and a group of children.
The excerpt presented in the school concerts shows a use of toms (western instrument – cylindrical wooden barrel on which plastic skins are stretched). This use is largely influenced by African or indus modes of playing (hitting the barrel, changing the pitch of the sound by hand pressure on the skin, etc.).
“To have dozens of children participate in the same music, more, less, or not at all, to familiarise them with the musical performance and the most virtuoso percussion group in the world. Not to give up this notion of virtuosity, to offer the children things that are feasible and yet with complex results, all the while trying to produce something that will interest my friends in Strasbourg, children everywhere and, I hope, passive listeners!
For the children, I thought it would be clearer to respect the three great groups of percussion: skin, wood, metal. So we have three sections each devoted to one of these families, separated by small recesses where the six percussionists indulge in individual amusements. Within the sections, on the other hand, the rigour is extreme: virtuosity is highlighted by its synchronisation, the rhythmic unison. In the wood, we have three groups of two synchronised musicians, in the metal, two groups of three and in the skin, the six musicians find themselves welded together on complex rhythmic formulas. The children’s play is based on paying great attention to what the percussion group is playing, from where the signals for their interventions come from. These are sometimes forms of activity where listening sensitivity and care in the treatment of the instruments used are the essential discipline or, sometimes, rhythmic formulas based on counts between 1 and 10, whose mixture can give a sufficiently rich effect.
Attentive listening, sensitivity and precision will give children the opportunity to respond “head high” to the proposals of their virtuoso elders! »
Jean-Pierre Drouet