Word: marteau
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BOULEZ: LE MARTEAU SANS MAITRE (Columbia). A bright, precise contemporary landmark conducted by the bright, precise man who wrote it, Pierre Boulez...
...much of the 20th century, many leading avant-garde composers have arranged their notes, rhythms and timbres according to predetermined schemes or series. Such major works as Arnold Schoenberg's Serenade and, more recently, Pierre Boulez's Le Marteau sans Maître have been serial compositions. Indeed no one has championed serialism more than has Boulez, the onetime enfant terrible of French music who is now the 47-year-old conductor of the New York Philharmonic and the BBC Symphony. Yet there was Boulez in Manhattan last week introducing his new 31-minute composition . . . explosante/fixe . . . and conceding...
...enfant terrible of French music during his younger days, Boulez is capable of fighting desperately for what he believes in-primarily, Boulez's own precise brand of serialism, Webern, and the two most important "traditionalists" in his life, Stravinsky and Debussy. His own music (notably Eclat, Le Marteau sans Maitre, fresh, glittering, mobile works filled with a constant sense of surprise that belies their tight structure) reflects his individuality. An acknowledged egotist ("And you can be sure, as I grow older I will become even more so"), Boulez possesses a blazing aphoristic gift for denouncing all those...
Boulez, who lives in Baden-Baden, knows better than most conductors how the music of his own time should sound, since he himself has composed some of the best of it (Eclat, Le Marteau sans Maítre). When he takes to the podium, he brings along insight, evangelism, an insider's care, and the ability to get what he wants from an orchestra. This is why he has become one of the most sought-after guest conductors in Europe and the U.S. It helps explain why, in the space of only a few years, his recordings of Schoenberg...
...nine movements of Le Marteau, Boulez presents three poems through the voice (Bethany Beardslee) and comments on them instrumentally. In each of the nine movements, Boulez uses a different ensemble chosen from the voice, alto flute (Harvey Sollberger), viola (Jacob Glick), guitar (Stanley Silverman), vibraphone (Paul Price), xylophone (Raymond Desroches), and percussion (Max Neuhaus). The texture of the sound is always clear, sometimes shimmering, sometimes punctiform, and always changing. With the flexibility of tempi and timbre goes an obvious fixity of notes and rhythmic patterns; certain intervals and rhythmic groupings recur constantly. And with all this planning, with all this...