De Natura Sonorum è un titolo decisamente abusato nella musica contemporanea. Questa volta parliamo di un brano elettroacustico di Bernard Parmegiani composto nel 1975. Un pezzo che a me piace molto, almeno la prima parte, tutta giocata su pochi suoni montati in molti modi diversi.

Gli interessati possono anche scaricare De Natura Sonorum dall’Internet Archive in flac a 24 bit.

Ecco il piano completo dell’opera:

The first series is made up of five movements, most of which bring electronic and instrumental sounds, and less often concrete ones, into relation, generally in couples.

1. lncidents/Resonances brings sympathetic resonances of concrete sound events with processes that allow variable continuousness (prolongation of sound) of electronic sources into controlled play. The “incidents” arc opposed to punctual “accidents” of the second movement.
2. Accidentals/Harmonics often very brief events of instrumental origin arc brought in to modify the harmonic timbre from the continuum that they undercut or on which they are superposed. Elsewhere, the placing with pitches reduced to a minimum creates a zone of attention to other phenomena generally masked by the melodic form applied to the instrumental play.
3. A Geological sonority resembles flying over a landscape in which the different “sound’ levels will emerge on the surface one after the other. Electronic and instrumental sounds become confused in fusion, seen from such a height
4. Dynamic of the resonance is a microphonic exploration of a single sound body that is made to resonate by means of different types of percussion
5. Elastic study juxtaposes sounds coming from the different “playing” of elastic of instrument skins (gold-beaters skin, zarb) and vibrating strings and different instrumental gestures analogous to this “playing:’ but created by the use of electronic generators of white noise.
6. Timbre conjugations last movement of this series uses the same material to apply rhythmic forms on a continuum of which the timbre is in continual variation

The second series falls back on electronic and concrete means whilst the instrumental sources only appear in a fleeting way.
lncidences/pulsations is a son of recall of the first movement and leads very rapidly to

8. Ephemeral nature interplay of short-lived instrumental and electronic sounds rather more individualised by the form of the internal trajectory than the material itself.
9. Induced matter just as molecular effervescence creates transformations of state, it would appear that the different stages of the sound material’s states here are products of each other, as if by induction
10. Intermixed wavelengths the audible vibrations of pizz interfere with the waves that we imagine “visible” like water droplets on a surface of the same material,
11. Full and free can he listened to as a study of the damped energies of bodies set into motion then rebounding. Such are the hollow “bubbles’ and the points bringing into relationship the heaviness of some, and the very fine movements of others,
12. Points versus fields here we have the idea of perspective of different sound themes that weave a sort of field network. imprison the repeated punctuated elements of the foreground and absorb them progressively so as to give free reign to the fields and melodic sound that opens out.

Stries, by Bernard Parmegiani is derived from an earlier composition, VIOLOSTRIES (1963) for violin and tape. Bernard PARMEGIANI has re-worked the tape and has based the parts for synthesizers on this new version.
The formal and musical logic of STRIES is therefore determined by the initial tape. It is very dense and orchestral (in the electroacoustic sense, as a definition of various planes of presence in the mixing of voices, of staggering in the sound spectrum, of coloring, and of the development of new sound elements of varying complexity). The synthesizers do not have a true solo role (in the classical sense of being contrasted to the tutti), but are superposed over the tape, mostly to accentuate it or to develop an aspect, without ever diverging from it or opposing its development.
In the first movement the synthesizer parts are not scored, but are freely improvised by the performers.

Sounds produced by a violin are fed into the synthesizers. The transformations they have undergone have not entirely erased their original character. Their interwoven horizontal form, their unchanging thickness, and their invariable color enable the TWO to sculpt them, to paint with them. The performers’ chisels and brushes are the modulators and filters which give them relief, color them, break them up, interchange them, lighten or darken them.
But in spite of all these manipulations, the original sound is preserved. It can still be divided: while one part of it is processed, the other remains intact. All this takes places within a framework which can be enriched on the spur of the moment with inspired finds.

from ANABlog

ANABlog ripubblica un “vecchio” (anni ’60) lavoro di Bernard Parmegiani che vale la pena di ascoltare.
Questo brano deriva da un pezzo del 1963, VoloStries per violino e nastro. Parmegiani riprende la registrazione di questo pezzo e la riarrangia sia come sonorità, elaborandone i suoni con i sintetizzatori dell’epoca, sia rimontando le parti originali.

Sounds produced by a violin are fed into the synthesizers. The transformations they have undergone have not entirely erased their original character. Their interwoven horizontal form, their unchanging thickness, and their invariable color enable the TWO to sculpt them, to paint with them. The performers’ chisels and brushes are the modulators and filters which give them relief, color them, break them up, interchange them, lighten or darken them.
But in spite of all these manipulations, the original sound is preserved. It can still be divided: while one part of it is processed, the other remains intact. All this takes places within a framework which can be enriched on the spur of the moment with inspired finds.

Bernard Parmegiani – Stries