Papillon (1973

François Bayle - 50 ans d'acousmatique (2012) {15CD Set INA GRM Official Digital Download rel 2015}
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© 2015 INA GRM | INA G 6033/6047
Classical / Musique Concrète / Avant-Garde Music / Experimental Electronic

Monumental! Lavishly conceived, superlative 15-CD Boxset with 160-page (French, English) booklet, a dream come true!!!! François Bayle's itinerary spans over five decades through which music was able to renovate its material through a sensible use of technology. The terms of Musique Concrète, Electroacoustics or Acousmatics, as conveniently proposed by François Bayle, ultimately explore a similar artistic approach: a creative and expressive work on recorded sound. This last half-century saw many major technical mutations and François Bayle - in the fertile context of the Grm seized the right opportunities, often initiating them through his function as director, so as to renovate and update creativity to serve what he called the Light Speed Sound.

Some four years after the demise of the Nice, bassist/vocalist Lee Jackson and drummer Brian Davison finally found a way of profiting from the prog rock gravy train they'd helped set in motion. With Patrick Moraz filling Keith Emerson's capacious boots, they recorded an album that in many ways surpasses anything the Nice ever recorded, and one whose ambition more than matched Emerson's new outfit, ELP. It helped that along with the standard panoply of prog keyboards – organ, piano, clavinet, Mellotron, and Moog – Moraz brought with him a jazz feel that clearly energized the rhythm section. Though there's no shortage of de rigueur complex time signatures here, this is also a band with fire in its belly, nowhere more so than in the last five minutes of the extended "Credo," where Jackson's bass runs and Davison's drumming combine to truly thrilling effect.

Vladimir Cosma became a highly regarded and hugely prolific soundtrack composer for the French cinema in the 60s and 70s. Cosma is a stellar example of the rich traditon of French movie composers, from Auric to Delerue to Desplat. Like them, he seems to effortlessly breathe melodies. His music can be lush, it can be spritely. It shimmeres, cascades, and yes, sometimes, it kicks butt. This second box set of his scores, like the first, is a treasure chest for fans of rich, melodic film music.

What do you get if you take The Nice and replace Keith Emerson for Patrick Moraz? The answer is simple Refugee, an excellent Symphonic Prog band. The previous story is well known, Keith Emerson, the heart and soul of The Nice left the band to form the first Prog supergroup ELP, so in that instant The Nice ceased to exist. They managed to survive until 1973 with to inferior releases "Elegy" and "Autumn from Spring" which mainly consist of older material and reworks of older tracks including a ghost keyboardist who was already playing in another band. But Lee Jackson and Brian Davidson wanted to revive the band, so they searched for another keyboardist who could replace Keith and they found him. The Swiss born virtuoso Patrick Moraz left Mainhorse so they recruited him and the result was incredibly solid…

Patton/Tora! Tora! Tora! features some of the modern era's finest orchestral performances. Indeed, The General's March From Patton, a medley of the most dramatic cues from the soundtrack (and not on this CD), is a stirring piece that ranks with the 1812 Overture (by Tchaikovsky) and Fireworks Music (by Handel) as a power classic. The CD does feature all of the elements of the medley along with some cues and incidental music that were not used in the score. As a bonus, this disc also features some of the music from Tora! Tora! Tora!. While neither soundtrack is presented in its entirety, the music is ample evidence of Jerry Goldsmith's reputation as one of Hollywood's film music composers. This CD is an excellent addition to any orchestral collection – classical and/or contemporary.

In large part a reworking of Jerry Goldsmith's rejected score for the sci-fi thriller Alien Nation, The Russia House proves a far more potent effort than its mongrel pedigree may suggest. Despite the film's Soviet Union setting, Goldsmith largely eschews Russian musical conventions in favor of a taut, suspenseful approach utterly American in its orientation. Combining sleek electronics with a jazz trio led by saxophonist Branford Marsalis, the composer creates a series of mysterious, archly sophisticated themes simmering with tension. In short, with The Russia House Goldsmith effectively updates the classic espionage formula for the digital era, composing a score as vital and innovative as any in his long and distinguished career. It's an unexpected and under-recognized masterpiece.

This Jerry Goldsmith soundtrack release is worth extended attention. The album is pulsingly rhythmic from the start, beginning with syncopation driven by whipcrack percussion and a clock-precise digital synthesizer pulse, on which Goldsmith builds ascending orchestra chords that sneakily reference Mars from Holst's The Planets without utterly aping the piece; this builds to a climax and changes, softening before managing to indicate menace without using the easy escape of minor chords. For once, despite the inevitable digital synthesizers and distinctive electronic percussion, Goldsmith has fashioned a score that's primarily driven by the orchestra, rather than being primarily dependent on electronic keyboards. To that extent, it's a rather old-fashioned action/suspense score, building and releasing tension in many varied ways.