Rare 2LP PIERRE MARIETAN Rose des vents FRENCH PRIVATE Press GERM Concrete music

	€		43
	$		50

2 X LP

PIERRE MARIETAN
"ROSE DES VENTS"

FRENCH PRIVATE PRESSING GERM
ORIGINAL PRESSING 1987

First commissioned by the French Government in 1981, the LP Rose Des Vents. Action Musicale evolved out of a six year project by Swiss composer Pierre Mariétan to document and musicalise the sound environment of urban landscapes within France, creating an inter-geographical auditory map of cities and townships located in the suburban reaches of Paris, including Bezons, Herblay, Montmagny and l’Isle Adam.

Through a mix of field recording, interviews, vegetable market catcalls, braying animals and urban hubbub, Mariétan paints a broad, psycho-acoustically vivid and decentralised profile of metropolitan life from the period; carried to the ear through a coupling with musical studio performance and serialist compositional technique. Over an hour and forty minutes, the recording provides an intersectional and ambient passage through environmental and urban narratives, the radiophonic voice of Ana de Carvalho offering fleeting, poetic orientation with announcements of each titled scene, divining and evoking the sonorous qualities of each landscape as it comes into focus. Each scene tangible yet non-specific, the artist arranging and signalling the possibility of civic and pastoral space as a musical container for spontaneous, sonorous interactions.

Mariétan’s profile is of a rigorous yet open and exploratory composer, utilising principles of chance and curiosity in organising found sound and often negotiating or encouraging encounters with improvisatory gesture or incidental and occurring sound. In 1966 he established the outfit GERM, grouping composers and musicians dedicated to developing new meeting points between composition and improvisation. Members assist in contributing recordings and performances throughout Rose Des Vents, including musical passages on piano, synthesizer, horn and saxophone. These studio pieces, played on saxophone by Daniel Kientzy or piano by Gerard Fremy, recall and redeploy techniques developed over the lifespan of the project, where site specific actions and concerts were performed within each of the towns.

In many ways, the album is a folding of each facet of the author’s life and work into a single representative culmination. A sympathy towards radiophonic or documentary production values is recognisable—Mariétan produced two iterations of Rose Des Vents. Action Musicale for Alain Trutat and Jean Tardieu’s ground-breaking Atelier De Création Radiophonique on Radio France Culture ahead of this LP release—alongside the influence of his work in urban acoustics and research into forms of sound ecology. So too is the obvious pleasure taken in introducing the sweetness of music to children, with notable samples from his educational workshops and sound installations helping to internalise and evoke a sense of inquisitive delight.

It’s these components, combined with themes and concerns about the acoustic environment that resonate 30 years later and establish Rose Des Vents as such an approachable, listenable and lovely piece of experimental sound art. The conjuration of an emotional or psychological plane through musical and metaphorical synthesis allows the listener to situate themselves within the montage in a near cinematic manner, discovering an underlying sonority embedded in the psychic atmospheres of communal life.

Tracklist

IA
00:00 Children shouting
00:18 Speaker: “Concert d’enfants à La Péniche. Le jour” (Children’s concert on The Barge, day time)
00:30 Children playing various music instruments
01:00 Low rumble of a barge’s engine
05:15 Barge’s engine+saxophone (Daniel Kientzy)
10:20 Barge’s engine+naive electronic loop (Gérard Frémy?)
13:00 Children (?) on metallic percussion and wind instruments
16:00 Speaker: “Approche, écarte” (bring it near, put it away)
17:30 Saxophone duo ends with synthesizer sounds and loop
19:18 Speaker: “Marché aux saxophones” (The saxophone outdoor market)
20:00 Sounds from an outdoor, organic food market
21:05 Discreet saxophone and synthesizer notes in the background
24:37 A vegetable peddler: “On est parti mon kiki dans la patate, là!” (Potatoes, potatoes!)

IB
00:00 Speaker: “Trains et jardin” (Trains and garden)
00:05 Brief saxophone call, then train station environmental sounds
04:04 Speaker: “Jardin et trains” (Garden and trains)
04:40 Soprano saxophone and synthesizer notes with train station environmental sounds
08:00 Speaker: “Carillon des Etaux. Cloches et saxo” (The Etaux carillon. Bells and saxophone)
08:10 Low electronic drones with saxophones
15:00 Quiet saxophone chamber ensemble
16:00 Bird sounds
18:00 Short electronic loop
18:20 Church bell. Bird sounds
19:53 Short electronic loop. Bird sounds
20:30 Speaker: “Lointain et près” (Near and far)
22:50 Bass and soprano saxophone duet

IIA
00:00 Speaker: “Octave et trains” (Octave with trains)
00:05 Saxophone playing octaves
02:40 Speaker: “Carillon de la Gare. Cergy-Pontoise” (The train station’s carillon in Cergy-Pontoise)
02:45 Train station environmental sounds with carillon
05;00 Train station environmental sounds with low electronic drone.
06:40 Train station environmental sounds with short synthesizer melody
07:00 Train station environmental sounds with various electronic loops
10:28 Speaker: “Extraits de La Rose. Approche. Pièces 1 à 12. Marche” (Excerpts from The Rose. Approach. Part #1-12. March)
10:36 Twelve piano+saxophone duets, with occasional synthesizer or basic sound treatment, like re-recording or speed modification
24:50 Bell sounds

IIB
00:00 Speaker: “Chevaux. Echo” (Horses. Echo)
00:10 Horse paddock environmental sounds
04:55 French horn+neighing horse duet
06:25 Speaker: “Matin. Midi. Soir” (Morning. Noon. Evening)
06:35 Bird sounds
08:47 Interview with local elder from the city of Meaux, near Paris, about an old radar and sound environment in general
12:00 Bird sounds with distant planes
13:00 Powerful, static electronic drone slowly growing
15:40 French horn. Street recordings and conversations
17:50 Speaker: “Péniche la nuit. Ecoute” (A barge at night. Listen)
18:00 Low rumble of the barge’s engine. Water sounds
19:00 Engine sounds growing in intensity. Loudest sound so far
22:20 Engine sound ends. Water sounds from a canal lock or bridge
23:45 Harmonium notes
24:00 Water sounds slowly decreasing