Search - Luc Ferrari :: Didascalies

Final works from an astonishing composer

Jeff Abell | Chicago, IL USA | 07/30/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Luc Ferrari was one of the founders of electronic music, specifically the type known as "musique concrete" - what we might call music made up of found sounds. Along with people like Pierre Schaeffer, he helped to launch works composed of the sounds of the real world. Ferrari liked to combine these real world sounds with traditional musical instruments, comparing it to the combination of photography with abstract painting. The three works on this CD are good examples of what an inventive, complex, and funny human being Ferrari was. Listening to "Recontres fortuites" (Lucky Encounters) is at times like having a film on with the picture turned off. Snippets of conversation and street sounds mix with sounds that are more than vaguely erotic. Through all this, violist Vincent Royer and pianist Jean-Phlippe Collard-Neven weave their own lines of "narrative." The title track, "Didascalies," (Stage Directions) is delightfully disjunct, filled with glimmers of what sounds like music for a Fellini film, mechanical noises, and Romantic effusions, all in a surrealistic collage. "Tautologos III" (subtitled "Would you like to tautologize with me?") is a set of instructions that the musicians turn into music. While this is not easy-listening music by any means, and will appeal mostly to those who enjoy new music, Ferrari is remarkably accessible to anyone with a sharp ear and an imagination, and the playing from Royer and Collard-Neven is never less than superior."